Your former Twitter handle may be valuable to someone, it appears.
X (previously Twitter) announced over the weekend that it would start selling inactive handles on the Elon Musk-owned platform. The company will oversee sales via a new Handles Marketplace, which will be accessible only to Premium and Premium Business users who pay. Some usernames will be “complimentary” (free), classified as “Priority” handles. Other handles will be available on a paid or invitation-only basis, designated as “Rare” handles.
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This might be somewhat unusual, but our colleagues at PCMag offer a clearer overview of the process. Free handles will be longer, featuring full names or alphanumeric phrases, while paid ones will be shorter and more identifiable, similar to those utilized by brands. Individuals looking for a free username must make a request and wait for approval, while paid usernames will be allocated via public drops or an invitation-only system.
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Reportedly, the prices for these usernames start at $2,500 and can escalate to seven figures based on “demand and uniqueness,” according to a support page referenced by PCMag. Ownership of sold usernames cannot be transferred, so theoretically, a resale market will not emerge for them.
This is certainly an innovative approach to the common challenge of wanting a username already claimed by an inactive user. However, there are considerable potential problems. Firstly, there’s no sign that the former owner of a sold username will receive any compensation. Furthermore, this could be taken advantage of for harmful purposes; one could easily envision someone acquiring @dril in the future and using it for crypto scams or other schemes prevalent on X nowadays.
Given that X has already transformed the original function of the blue checkmark from a verification tool into a paid status symbol, this could potentially lead to digital identity theft, which the current ownership and moderation policies of the site might not be equipped to handle.