Elon Musk Took Over This ‘@X’ Twitter Handle for X.com Rebranding, Offered Merch, Meeting With Execs to the Original Owner

Elon Musk recently made a significant move on Twitter by rebranding the microblogging platform as ‘X’. However, it turns out that the original owner of the “@x” handle, which is now the official handle of the former-Twitter, was not paid for the change of hands.

The “@x” handle was originally owned by Gene X Hwang, a San Francisco-based photographer and COO and co-founder of Orange Photography. The account was registered in 2007 and had over 26.9K followers, but it became private, requiring users to follow in order to view the tweets. With Musk’s rebranding, the ownership of this handle was transferred to ‘X,’ the new name for the platform. According to a report by The Telegraph, Hwang was not compensated for giving up his handle on the platform.

According to The Telegraph, Hwang received an email informing him of the account’s takeover by the company. The email stated that the account was now the “property of ‘x’ essentially.” Hwang shared with the publication, “They just took it essentially – kinda what I thought might happen.” He mentioned that he was offered some X-themed merchandise and a meeting with the company’s management, but so far, there has been no financial incentive offered to him.

As calrified in the report, Twitter users don’t have legal rights over their usernames. However, the company’s terms of service allow them to remove accounts in cases of trademark infringement. Musk now owns the X.com domain, which redirects users to the Twitter account of X. As context, Musk plans to turn X.com into an “everything app” that includes audiovisual content, messaging, payments, and banking features.

Regarding Hwang’s original account, it has been moved to the new handle “@x12345678998765.” He told The Telegraph that he would appreciate financial compensation for the takeover if approached, but it would depend on the offer.