Twitter is ditching the egg avatar

     A Drexel University professor is under fire after tweeting that he “trying not to vomit” after witnessing a first          class passenger give up his seat to an armed service member on a flight.

Twitter's egg avatar, often a symbol of anonymous online harassment on the social media service, is no more.

On Friday, Twitter confirmed it's ditching the egg in favor of a more generic, default icon resembling a human figure. Twitter cites several reasons for the change, including encouraging users to switch to an image more reflective of their personality. But one reason for the switch is the association with online abuse.

"We’ve noticed patterns of behavior with accounts that are created only to harass others – often they don’t take the time to personalize their accounts," reads an excerpt from a Twitter blog post explaining the change. "This has created an association between the default egg profile photo and negative behavior, which isn’t fair to people who are still new to Twitter and haven’t yet personalized their profile photo."

The design was inspired by generic iconography such as bathroom signs. However, Twitter says they wanted to avoid a silhouette with a circular head shape because of its association with masculinity.

"We reviewed many variations of our figure, altering both the head and shoulders to feel more inclusive to all genders," said Twitter. 

The removal of the egg avatar arrives at a time where Twitter is still wrestling with how to curtail harassment on its platform. Last month, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey pledged a "completely new approach to abuse," starting with a series of updates including stopping users permanently suspended from the platform from creating new accounts.

Twitter is trying to shed a reputation as a home to Internet trolls to fend off pressure from Wall Street to boost its user base. Last quarter, Twitter had 319 million monthly active users, up 4% from the previous year.