From TechCrunch: The owner of the @x Twitter handle confirmed that the company, now known as X, took over his account without warning or financial compensation, telling him the handle is property of X. The handle had previously belonged to Gene X Hwang of the corporate photography and videography studio Orange Photography. In a letter, the company formerly known as Twitter thanked Hwang for his loyalty and offered him a selection of X merchandise and a tour of X’s HQ, as a “reflection of our appreciation.”
The @x handle mishandling was only one of the many haphazard steps involved in the rebranding of Twitter to X, owner Elon Musk’s favorite letter. According to reports, Twitter didn’t secure the intellectual property rights to the “X” brand, as Microsoft, Meta and others have claims to various “X” trademarks. It also didn’t get permission from the city to remove the Twitter signage on the building, forcing police to stop the work. It didn’t fully update its website and app, which though now sporting an “X” still implored users to “search Twitter” or push a button to “Tweet.”
And it didn’t reach out in advance to secure the @x Twitter handle for itself, as TechCrunch recently learned.
As a result, Twitter’s account was renamed “X” but the handle, until today, still read “@Twitter.”
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