Elon Musk and Grimes welcomed the birth of their first child a couple of days ago.
The name they chose for their son certainly raised a few eyebrows - X Æ A-12. Grimes has explained the origin of the name, in a tweet reading: "‘X’ refers to “the unknown variable.
"Æ’ is “my elven spelling of Ai (love &/or Artificial intelligence).
"A-12’ is a nod to the “precursor to SR-17 (our favourite aircraft). No weapons, no defenses, just speed. Great in battle, but non-violent." [Musk later corrected her, noting that the aircraft was the SR-71.]
She added that the 'A' was also a reference to "Archangel, my favorite song."
•X, the unknown variable ⚔️
•Æ, my elven spelling of Ai (love &/or Artificial intelligence)
•A-12 = precursor to SR-17 (our favorite aircraft). No weapons, no defenses, just speed. Great in battle, but non-violent 🤍
+
(A=Archangel, my favorite song)
(⚔️🐁 metal rat)— 𝖦𝗋𝗂𝗆𝖾𝗌 ⏳ (@Grimezsz) May 6, 2020
However, whether the name will actually be legitimate has come into contention.
David Glass, a family law attorney, told People (via EW), that while the baby's name isn't technically illegal, it won't be accepted as valid by the state.
He told the publication: "In California, you can only use the '26 characters' of the English language in your baby name.
"Thus, you can't have numbers, Roman numerals, accents, umlauts or other symbols or emojis. Although an apostrophe, for a name like 'O'Connor,' is acceptable."
Glass explained that if Grimes and Musk fill out X Æ A-12's birth certificate as such at the hospital "with the odd numbers, dashes and symbols, it will be submitted and then rejected and they'll be asked to submit it again."
He concluded: "They have an opportunity to appeal the rejection of the birth certificate application but it's unlikely that it will be granted because, again, California ... has been struggling with using symbols."
Seems like a lot of effort. Then again, wouldn't you do anything for your child?