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Headless Brands

13 points by jger15 7y ago

_nalply 7y ago
I would like to add to the introduction about what a brand is. A brand is a tool for buying products. Buyers often or at least sometimes don't have complete information about the product they plan to buy. They can't examine products thoroughly before buying because they don't have the time, expertise or opportunity, even if there's a need. Brands can help here. Companies create a brand and customers trust a brand. This can work because a brand is like a promise of specific characteristics and quality. Think Coca Cola: everybody knows what to expect from a bottle even without opening and tasting before buying. Companies tend to take care of brands because they know if they misuse a brand, the brand can lose its value of helping customers buying the product. This said, however, there have been misuses of brands, or at least rent seeking. Customers are sometimes slow in pricing in the change of value of a brand. If a well-known brand for home appliance is newly being used for cheap and low-quality crap, the brand will be destroyed, but not before many buyers have been screwed over. This means that brands are not a panacea for the problem of buyer's incomplete information. Edit: The words "buy" or "company" should perhaps be better replaced by "decide for" or "group", because brands are not only helpful for buying things, but also for general decision processes of people.
leowoo91 7y ago
Isn't most popular open-source projects also fall into that category? And what happens if someone files a trademark on bitcoin?
- _nalply 7y ago
  Agreed. And for the second question: if that is possible, this would prevent the "headless" entity to use the words and symbols signifying the brand. If the majority of possible consumers of the brand disagrees that the owner of the trademark really owns the brand, this would destroy or at least diminish the value of the brand. A brand is more than the words and symbols used to signify the brand and therefore the brand itself can't be trademarked, only those words and symbols. It's like the word "apple" is not itself an apple.
- ChainOfFools 7y ago
  Or, ahem, registers Bitcoin.com, or sets up and controls the r/bitcoin subreddit
notzuck 7y ago
Good lord that was a hard read. It's so academic it's pointless.
ricc 7y ago
So basically any identity that has been established by the members of a community instead of a singular entity... Like subcultures and other grassroots movements.

13 points by jger15 7y ago

I would like to add to the introduction about what a brand is. A brand is a tool for buying products. Buyers often or at least sometimes don't have complete information about the product they plan to buy. They can't examine products thoroughly before buying because they don't have the time, expertise or opportunity, even if there's a need. Brands can help here. Companies create a brand and customers trust a brand. This can work because a brand is like a promise of specific characteristics and quality. Think Coca Cola: everybody knows what to expect from a bottle even without opening and tasting before buying. Companies tend to take care of brands because they know if they misuse a brand, the brand can lose its value of helping customers buying the product. This said, however, there have been misuses of brands, or at least rent seeking. Customers are sometimes slow in pricing in the change of value of a brand. If a well-known brand for home appliance is newly being used for cheap and low-quality crap, the brand will be destroyed, but not before many buyers have been screwed over. This means that brands are not a panacea for the problem of buyer's incomplete information. Edit: The words "buy" or "company" should perhaps be better replaced by "decide for" or "group", because brands are not only helpful for buying things, but also for general decision processes of people.

leowoo91 7y ago

Isn't most popular open-source projects also fall into that category? And what happens if someone files a trademark on bitcoin?

_nalply 7y ago
Agreed. And for the second question: if that is possible, this would prevent the "headless" entity to use the words and symbols signifying the brand. If the majority of possible consumers of the brand disagrees that the owner of the trademark really owns the brand, this would destroy or at least diminish the value of the brand. A brand is more than the words and symbols used to signify the brand and therefore the brand itself can't be trademarked, only those words and symbols. It's like the word "apple" is not itself an apple.
ChainOfFools 7y ago
Or, ahem, registers Bitcoin.com, or sets up and controls the r/bitcoin subreddit

notzuck 7y ago

Good lord that was a hard read. It's so academic it's pointless.

ricc 7y ago

So basically any identity that has been established by the members of a community instead of a singular entity... Like subcultures and other grassroots movements.