You've been calling the X button on the PlayStation controller the wrong name for decades

Sony

The latest version of Sony's long-running DualShock gamepad for PlayStation - the DualShock 4.

• Sony's PlayStation game consoles have used an evolving version of the same gamepad since the mid-'90s, when the PlayStation 1 first launched.
• The controller, known as the "DualShock," features a characteristic set of symbols on its buttons:△, O, X, and ▢.
• Traditionally, people have referred to those symbols as "triangle, circle, X (as in 'ecks'), and square."
• As it turns out, the X is actually the "cross" button.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

If you've used any PlayStation game console across the last 20-plus years, you're familiar with the PlayStation gamepad: The DualShock.

Its parallel thumbsticks, shoulder buttons, and symbol-clad buttons have become iconic in mainstream culture.

Complimentary Tech Event

Transform talent with learning that works

Capability development is critical for businesses who want to push the envelope of innovation.Discover how business leaders are strategizing around building talent capabilities and empowering employee transformation.Know More

Perhaps most of all, the X button - the button used most often for affirming selections, among many other actions - is extremely recognizable. 

Here's something you almost certainly didn't know: It's not actually called the "X" button.

Twitter

When Sony's official PlayStation Twitter account asked its 17 million followers what they call the button, an overwhelming majority confirmed it was known to them as the "X" button (pronounced: "ecks" button).

But there's a sharp difference between what the world has adopted as the button's official name and what Sony calls it.

Indeed - the "X" button is actually the cross button, according to Sony's official word.

That has long been the case, but clearly it isn't a well-known fact given the stark difference in responses to Sony's own polling.

The "X" has long been a point of contention in product names. Both Apple's OS X operating system and iPhone X are often referred to by people as "oh ess ecks" and "iPhone ecks" - but Apple thinks of those X symbols like the Latin numeral for ten, thus "OS Ten" and "iPhone Ten." 

That isn't stopping anyone from calling them OS X and iPhone X, of course, and that situation clearly applies in Sony's case as well.