X Factor: Musk's Rebrand Could Invite 100s Of Trademark Challengers Including Meta, Microsoft
Elon Musk may not have dotted his i's and crossed his t's before settling on X.
On Monday, Musk rebranded Twitter to X after months of teasing such a move. However, we now learn that Facebook/Instagram-parent Meta already has a trademark on an X logo for use in "online social networking services."
Meta isn't the only heavyweight that could throw a legal wrench in Musk's rebranding: The X logo that has replaced Twitter's blue bird is a near-dead ringer for Microsoft's X Window System logo from way back in 1984, reports Fast Company. Microsoft also owns an X trademark associated with its Xbox gaming console.
"There's a 100% chance that Twitter is going to get sued over this by somebody," trademark attorney Josh Gerben tells Reuters. How popular is X? Gerben tallied almost 900 active trademarks on the letter across a variety of industries. Underscoring the density of the trademark thicket, Twitter Japan may not be able to become X Japan, as that name is already trademarked by a Japanese rock band.
That highly-varied usage could be particularly problematic for Musk, given his vision for X to evolve into an "everything app" spanning social media, bill payments, financial services, retail purchases, entertainment and more.
— Michael Warburton (@MichaelWarbur17) July 24, 2023
The widespread use by other companies points a double-edged sword at Musk's use of X. On one hand, it presents him with several hundred potential legal challenges from other companies already using it. At the same time, the use of X is so common that Musk could have difficulty preventing others from joining the X party.
"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," trademark attorney Douglas Masters tells Reuters.
Speaking of not thinking things through, in the race to follow through on the rebrand, workers started removing the bird logo from Twitter's San Francisco headquarters on Monday, but were halted by police. It seems Twitter didn't apply for permits and, worse, didn't block the sidewalk to protect pedestrians.
The police shut down the operation to remove Twitter’s name and replace it with X headquarters as Elon Musk reportedly didn’t get permit for all the equipment on the street. pic.twitter.com/K9IrZVNr8d
— Pop Tingz (@ThePopTingz) July 24, 2023
Where a potential Meta challenge is concerned, the anticipated cage match fight between Musk and Meta's Mark Zuckerberg could be used to settle an X dispute...something like when Southwest Airlines' comical CEO Herb Kelleher arm-wrestled the CEO of Stevens Aviation over the slogan "Just Plane Smart." Stevens won, $15,000 in ticket revenue was given to charity, and they ended up sharing the slogan.
