Whose hand is behind this travesty? X has introduced a confusing hand gesture prompting users to promote their posts, drawing criticism and confusion among users. The feature’s abrupt introduction, reportedly linked to previous growth tactics, has sparked comparisons to controversial strategies.
Some interface changes and nudges, like bright buttons urging you to subscribe in apps, are mildly annoying but easy to ignore. Others are so in your face that you want to throw your phone in a river. X’s new push to get users to promote their posts is firmly in that category. Over the last 24 hours, a growing number of users have posted that a mysterious hand pointing to the “promote” button suddenly showed up while they were writing a post. This has irked people across the board. With Halloween around the corner, it could be a prank meant to spook users, though X hasn’t said so. And even users who wanted to promote a post and spend money might be scared off after seeing the hand. I just went to write a tweet and a massive hand popped up pointing to the promote button 😵💫 pic.twitter.com/cLPP5pNaNP — Tom Warren (@tomwarren) October 26, 2026 Why is there a man pointing on my screen?!?! pic.twitter.com/CXhfXVKZLH — Molly O’Shea (@MollySOShea) October 26, 2026 what the hell is this? jesus christ please never do this again twitter pic.twitter.com/uRFBha7Vhl — Matt Slotnick (@matt_slotnick) October 26, 2026 I was going to post when this huge, in-your-face arm popped up pointing at the promote button. LOL WHAT. pic.twitter.com/4Iicq5tKoK — Dak (@dakdevs) October 26, 2026 WTF @elonmusk , if I wanted jump scares I would’ve watched a horror movie instead. P.S. this hand popped out of nowhere and conveniently when the words “engagement farming” are in the tweet. pic.twitter.com/NWxt81AYie — Ershad Kaleebullah (@r3dash) October 27, 2026 TBPN podcast’s president Dylan Abruscato said that this engagement trick was the “most Nikita-coded thing I’ve ever seen,” a nod to the growth tactics associated with Nikita Bier, X’s former head of product. I was just about to post when this huge, in-your-face arm popped up pointing at the promote button (yes, this is a real screenshot) The most Nikita coded thing I’ve ever seen. So obstructive, yet so effective pic.twitter.com/TOI2puhliO — Dylan Abruscato (@DylanAbruscato) October 26, 2026 Bier left the platform in August after almost a year at the helm . On Monday, Bier’s former boss and ex-head of product for Snap and Discord, Peter Sellis, posted that he has taken over as X’s product chief. I’m joining the team at @X to lead Product. I am a huge believer in @SpaceX ’s mission to extend human consciousness to the stars, so it’s time to make shitposting multiplanetary. X is the best way to find out what’s happening in the world right now and talk about it. The team… — Peter Sellis (@petersellis) October 26, 2026 It’s unclear if the hand is Sellis’s doing. We have reached out to X for a comment, and will update our story if we hear back. Topics Apps When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission . This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Ivan Mehta Ivan covers global consumer tech developments at TechCrunch. He is based out of India and has previously worked at publications including Huffington Post and The Next Web. You can contact or verify outreach from Ivan by emailing [email protected] or via encrypted message at ivan.42 on Signal. View Bio November 4 Boston Buy One Pass, Get a Second Free Cover more ground at TechCrunch’s ultimate founder bootcamp of the year by bringing your co-founder or partner for free Book before the BOGO deal expires Register Now Most Popular Grok releases the first seven minutes of its AI-generated ‘Odyssey’ Anthony Ha The AI graveyard: a running list of projects and startups that didn’t make it Lauren Forristal Warhound raises $200M to engineer war dogs and arm them with Anduril gear Dominic-Madori Davis Uber puts all 30,000 employees on ChatGPT Work Lucas Ropek Airbnb limits chores for guests, sparking backlash from hosts Lauren Forristal Tesla starts Optimus robot production in California as profit falls 43% Kirsten Korosec Sean O’Kane The internet is having a very bad cybersecurity day Sarah Perez