Twitter can't turn into X: 'X' is owned by Meta&Microsoft

Elon Musk has recently said that Twitter will change its name to X moving onward, in what seems to be a rebrand of the 16 years old social network. And starting this past Monday, Musk officially changed Twitter’s name to X.

But there is a problem. It seems the ‘X’ trademark is owned by multiple companies, up to even 300 companies in the North American region alone, according to the latest reports. Meta and Microsoft are among them, so Musk might have some problems trying to get his wish true.

For example, Microsoft has owned an X trademark since 2003 and it’s related to Xbox communications and video games studios. On the other hand, Meta Platforms – which recently released the Threads platform, as a new Twitter rival – owns a blue-and-white letter “X” registered in 2019 and it’s related to software and social media.

However, protecting a single letter can be hard, and Elon Musk will probably only use it in a specific design, so as to not face legal consequences. Reporting for Reuters, Douglas Masters, a lawyer, says that “Given the difficulty in protecting a single letter, especially one as popular commercially as ‘X’, Twitter’s protection is likely to be confined to very similar graphics to their X logo. The logo does not have much distinctive about it, so the protection will be very narrow.”

But we all know that once Elon Musk wants something, he usually gets it. X is already live. So for now, forget about Twitter. Maybe try Bluesky or Threads.

And let us know in the comments section below which one do you like more.