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So you think you own your Twitter name?
- tnorthcutt 16y agoThis shouldn't be a surprise to anyone.
- devinj 16y agoOf course it shouldn't. No facts should be surprising, but they are. So what do you do about it? You either fix peoples' expectations to match reality, or you fix reality to match peoples' expectations. Considering that the expectations here seem pretty reasonable, I'd personally rather the latter.
- jerf 16y ago"Fixing reality" is mathematically impossible. Not all people and groups of people can be given their choice of a unique name in a single global namespace. You can define different conflict resolution schemes, but there will be conflicts and there will be losers and there will be people who think the losers should have won (not least of which, the losers themselves) regardless of what you do.
- Udo 16y agoDisclaimer: I'm going to assume this really happened, even though it's coming from a slightly suspicious looking Blogspot address, the description itself looks believable. The surprising thing here is not the obvious injustice or the callousness of the Twitter team. Rather, it's that people think they somehow have a right to use Twitter's services and accounts like they were their property. The same goes for people who build businesses on Facebook and every other monolithic site. I think users need to understand that they are on someone else's turf, and they are subject to whatever the company decides to do. There is no reasonable expectation of fairness, or of free speech for that matter. That's why building a business on Twitter is foolish. I hear it's done successfully all the time, yet people have to understand this is a very shaky foundation. We're not even Twitter's customers. Advertisers are Twitter's customers. Nobody should be surprised about this, in fact it's a miracle "outrageous" stories don't happen more often.
- greyman 16y agoWhy there shouldn't be a reasonable expectation of fairness, i.e. that twitter (or any free service for that matter) will not hand your nickname to another entity? I believe there indeed is an unwritten rule on the Internet, that the nickname should belong to the first person who registered it... I mean, if he didn't violate the trademark at the time of registering the account. Of course, twitter has the right to do it, but still I don't find it normal.
- tptacek 16y agoThere is absolutely no such rule.
- Vivtek 16y agoAnd in fact Twitter is basically legally required to do just as they've done in this case. Sucks, but reality often does. Takeaway: Having a Twitter name is not a free substitute for having a presence as a legal entity.
- mckoss 16y agoI don't think so. You want to reference the statute? Domain name conflicts, have to go through a more proper administrative and legal process, for example. Twitter could chose to handle it like a domain name challenge, I believe.
- Vivtek 16y agoDo you want to reference the statute? Domain name conflicts are not addressed by any legal statute that I know of; it's simply been the policy of the registrars from the start because everybody knew it was going to be a problem. Twitter didn't have that foresight. The key is this: if this new organization GIRLGEEKS has a trademark, they have a trademark. What's Twitter's motivation to challenge that in court? None whatsoever. If the original @girlgeeks wants to challenge it, she's welcome to do so, but the point is that trademark law does exist, a trademark was granted (even though I think it probably shouldn't have been) and somebody has to foot the bill if it's going to be contested, and as much as I'd like to think it's the person with the money, even I don't think that's Twitter's obligation. Now, if it were me (and it was, for years, at Despammed.com), I'd say, sorry, that name is taken unless you get a court order, leaving the ball in the court where it should have been to start with. Twitter is obviously more craven than I am, but then I was very small and not concerned with paying a staff. The point is, if you want rights to a name, just using it on some free service is sadly not enough to get them, and complaining that a large organization is not being fair is no substitute, even if true.
- rtp 16y agoJust because it is within the rights of Twitter to be a dick doesn't mean that it _should_ be a dick, and from where I am standing, Twitter is currently acting like a dick.
- janewilson90 16y agoTwitter and the person who stole the username. The original girlgeeks even helped them set up and knows them.
- Vivtek 16y agoOuch, that's a lot worse than somebody independently registering a trademark as an organization and then getting the name from Twitter.
- dmoo 16y agoexactly: legal != moral
- svag 16y agoSo, the same applies to the "free" web services like gmail and MSN/hotmail? They just can take your username and give it to someone else?
- brazzy 16y agoOF COURSE THEY CAN! It boggles my mind that anyone would seriously need to ask that question. Entitlement much? Yes, it would not be nice of them to do it. Yes, it could be bad for their image and ultimately even their business to do it. No, they shouldn't do it. But they can, and it's not illegal.
- daleharvey 16y agoIt has nothing to do with entitlement, I am pretty sure a lot of people would be surprised to know that their gmail account could be given to someone else at random.
- Vivtek 16y agoA lot of people are surprised about a lot of things - most people don't know what's in their food, just off the top of my head - but that doesn't mean they have some right to have things they way they thought they were. There's just so far a sense of outrage will take you.
- brazzy 16y agoHow exactly is that not a (false) sense of entitlement?
- _delirium 16y ago> But they can, and it's not illegal. If it's just shutting down an account, probably true. But if GMail started giving people's email accounts to other people, which would allow other people to start receiving their bank statements, business correspondence, password resets, etc., I don't think it would be an open/shut case. Courts would likely want to do something about it, and there are various legal theories that are broad enough to potentially be employed, e.g. detrimental reliance on representations, tortious interference, or contributory negligence. Consider an extreme case: someone is using GMail for their business. Google cuts a deal with their competitor to intercept the business's email and send it to the competitor. Would this be legal? If Gmail accounts and the email in them are unrestricted Google property that it may dispose of as it wishes, then it would be; Google can of course sell its own internal email to anybody it wants. But my guess is that this scenario wouldn't be legal, despite the fact that the business is not paying Google for the email account, and Google owns the servers that are receiving the mail.
- philjackson 16y agoI'm @philjackson (my name being Phil Jackson, obviously) and there's a Phil Jackson who's prominent in the world of basketball. I've often wondered, if basketball Phil Jackson went to Twitter and said "I want @philjackson", would they give it to him?
- antidaily 16y agoThat would be troubling. It's one thing to let a major brand take a name back from some schmoe using it for no reason, but that's your actual name. Jackson could easily go by CoachPhilJackson and be found.
- bmrr 16y agoIt's very likely they would if he asked. Celebrities and business bring huge traffic to Twitter and it's in Twitter's best interest to have more of them sign up. Some might think it's also in their best interest not to screw their users, but sadly it appears Twitter is moving towards Bieberfest as opposed to meaningful conversation. How many Bieber fans care if your name is taken from you?
- jokermatt999 16y agoit appears Twitter is moving towards Bieberfest as opposed to meaningful conversation Honestly though, the medium suits Bieberfest a lot better than it suits meaningful conversation. It's tough to have a good conversation in less than 140 characters. I'm not surprised they went with the angle that's better marketing/money, either.
- kovar 16y agoFrom the posting: "Last night an organsation called @GIRLGEEKS contacted Twitter to say they had registered trademark for Girl Geeks and wanted the @girlgeeks account for themselves." The original owner could have pursued similar protection and avoided the problem.
- pbhjpbhj 16y ago>The original owner could have pursued similar protection and avoided the problem. Trademarks cost money - international protection costs quite a lot of money. Do Twitter accept any registered trademark, like if I've a registered trademark in Afghanistan (say) will they protect me against someone with the same mark registered in the US or in Europe? It seems that Twitter aren't bound to give a RTM holder the name but the person using it could be sued if they're using it to trade and not making it clear that their goods&services do not originate with the RTM holder.
- collypops 16y agoThe dispute should have been settled between the two users. Twitter had no place in this, unless they were forced to do something as a result of court action resulting from a private dispute, which they weren't.
- nollidge 16y agoBased on what the new @girlgeeks holder (Mia Chapman) has said [1], it looks like she talked to Twitter only as a first step, and never expected them to just hand it over with no notice to the previous name holder (Morna Simpson). Also sounds as if Mia's trying to resolve things with Morna mano-a-mano (so to speak) now. [1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2313593 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2313593
- basseq 16y agoIn the U.S. at least, I could see reasonable legal action on the part of the original owner, as she seems to have a common law trademark that would supersede any legal trademark. Maybe Twitter would accept that argument, or maybe you'd have to go to the USPTO and contest the filing (costing more money). Filing is expensive ($3-400), but it's a thought considering how many of us have online identities that are legally unprotected.
- metageek 16y agoSeems like this is a violation of Twitter's obligations under the ECPA to ensure that someone's private communications are not delivered to a third party.
- pbhjpbhj 16y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Communications_Privacy_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Communications_Priva... is US law, does this apply to protect people in Scotland?
- rmc 16y agoIt may not apply to Scotland, however it /should/ apply to Twitter, which is based in the USA AFAIR
- collypops 16y agoOnly the username was taken over. The account itself is still owned by the original user (just with a new username). Nothing private would have been transferred.
- stuhacking 16y agoDMs and @mentions will now be redirected to the new account until the original user is able to send the change of username notification. There's now a chance, however slim, that a private message will arrive at the wrong person as a result of Twitter's actions. I'm ignoring the question of whether Twitter should be a medium for private communications.
- graywh 16y agoyou can't send DMs to a non-follower
- biot 16y agoYou're looking at this from the wrong angle. A DM sent to girlgeeks will be delivered to girlgeeks, exactly as the sender specified... much in the same way that a postal carrier will deliver private snail mail to a street address even if the intended recipient has already moved. Unlike snail mail where you can address a specific individual by name (thus making it illegal for someone else to open it) Twitter is the equivalent of "Dear Occupant" and whoever is at that address can open it.
- knowzie 16y agoI think owning the .com should be the new criteria for owning a trademark.
- davidu 16y agoThat's a terrible idea. Just think about it for more than one second.
- knowzie 16y agoI guess it would make trademarks pretty expensive.
- rosswarren 16y agoNo really, it's a terrible idea.
- mckoss 16y agoOne second is up. I stil don't understand your reasoning. Care to explain?
- techsupporter 16y agoWho owns whitehouse.com? Should that entity now have a right to "White House" as a trademark and, in the case of this discussion, @whitehouse on Twitter, on the basis of owning that domain?
- mckoss 16y agoYes, but the domain registration process is just another "registration process". The domain one is "modern" (inexpensive, online, self-service), the trademark one (USPTO) is "old" ("manual", "offline", "cumbersome", "expensive"). Why should the government get whitehouse.com - they are entitled to whitehouse.gov. Are you saying governments should have precedence over the priority of other entities? Since we are discussing here, an international trademark system, I think the properties of the domain registration system are much preferred to the properties of the fragmented and ill-defined international trademark process.
- xd 16y agoI found the statement made by the other side insightful: http://www.girl-geeks.co.uk/statement/Girl%20Geeks%20Statement.pdf http://www.girl-geeks.co.uk/statement/Girl%20Geeks%20Stateme... [pdf] "Just for the record, I have personally sacrificed personal savings and a full time salary for the last few years for this cause Girl Geeks. I certainly did not do any of this for self-promotion or gain and believe in supporting those who need it 100%." She done a pretty good job of promoting herself in the response.
- davidu 16y agoTheir DNS is broken. :-(
- collypops 16y agoIt is insightful, but still, she's only addressing a small part of the problem. The larger issue here is that Twitter facilitate this kind of activity. It should have been resolved between the two parties. She should never have contacted Twitter to commandeer a @username. Saying you did it on "[advice] by legal councel" is _not_ an excuse. She can't hide behind that. Everybody makes sacrifices in life for their causes. That is not an excuse. Lots of people are passionate and genuine. That is not an excuse. I'm glad she apologised. If she genuinely wishes to resolve this, I've got a suggestion. Return the username.
- kelnos 16y agoSo? Making personal and financial sacrifices entitles you to appropriate someone else's online persona based on an after-the-fact trademark filing?
- njharman 16y agoNo, why on earth would you ever think that? I don't own my street address, SSN, Prison ID, don't even own my given name.
- dasil003 16y agoPrison ID, that's a nice touch.
- pavel_lishin 16y ago> I don't ... even own my given name. Sure, but I bet you'd be pissed if N. J. Harman, LTD demanded that your change your name to avoid confusion, and could enforce their demands.
- catshirt 16y agoare there no legal restrictions or implications surrounding naming your child after a registered trademark?
- rm445 16y agoNot as far as I'm aware of, though in some countries the authorities have some oversight of names, so you might be stopped from naming your child Pepsi Microsoft or other silly things. More to the point, there are laws governing what names you can trade under. For example in the UK I think (this isn't my field, info could be wrong/out of date) sole traders and partnerships can legally trade under a personal name - so if your name was McDonald you could run a restaurant under your real name, but you'd probably have to be careful to always carefully list it as J. McDonald (London) or similar to avoid infringing McDonald's trademarks.
- pdx 16y agoWe need a way to own our online persona's. We have one, it's called an email address at a domain that you registered. Unfortunately, we don't have an analogous mechanism for instant message traffic. Actually we do, it's called a jabber server on a domain that you registered. But we don't have a way to publish our short, trivial thoughts to the world, and still maintain ownership of our identity. But, really, we do. It's called RSS. People should publish their "tweets" via RSS feeds from their registered domain name. You could "follow" people by subscribing to their RSS, and you could "tweet" with a front end on your phone/computer that looks exactly like your current twitter client, but is linked to your RSS feed. An open source library that made all this easy could be written, for the geeks, and for the non-geeks, there would be services that popped up that would host for you, but since the domain name is still in your name, you can move to another hosting provider at will. Now, how to get everybody to switch?
- franksalim 16y agoAnd x years down the line we'll see "so you think you own your domain name?" Actually, we've already seen articles like that. It's just more difficult (but not impossible) to lose your domain name for trademark reasons.
- pavel_lishin 16y agoOr government intervention.
- VladRussian 16y agoi personally like the nissan.com fight (10+ years).
- riffic 16y agoI've identified the namespace "problem" on twitter for a few years now. This is exactly what you get when you put all your eggs into a single service provider's basket.
- e03179 16y agoAnyone notice that Druge Report got on Twitter, announced the link and their account was @DRUDGE_? Then a day or two later, it was @DRUDGE.
- betolive 16y agoAn interesting example related to the ongoing online identity wars. Facebook, Google & Twitter are fighting to get our time investment in their free platforms without giving us the assurance that our investment will be rewarded. If only the decentralized Twitter proposed a few years ago would have been built, we (users) would have more control about our identity, probably it is a little bit late now.
- drdaeman 16y agoSo, this way or another, path leads to decentralized social networks, where your identity is protected with your knowledge of private key.
- br1 16y agoIf I had the money I would trademark unprotected twitter accounts just to have them (temporarily) assigned to me and make more noise about this outrage.
- code_duck 16y agoIt certainly appears that as far as these companies are concerned, users are owed nothing and developers are owed nothing. We're just stepping stones on the way to an IPO or exit. Plenty of micro business owners have found this out the hard way on sites like Etsy or eBay, for instance - they might think that the shop is theirs, and put the URL on their business cards, promote it at craft shows, on their cars, in expensive promotional graphics. All it takes is one idiot admin to close your account, and it's gone (Etsy in particular has notoriously poor practices regarding closing customers accounts, going back for years. There are plenty of of customer service horror stories there. eBay has a long history of NARUing sellers also). I've heard stories about flickr recently, too, deleting accounts - people lose photos, messages, contacts going back years and the company responsible simply doesn't care. The only thing to do is to have your own domain, own website, use open source software, and know what you're doing technically or be close to someone who does. The only people who can take that away from you is courts or the government. This is also why we need networks that work like Diaspora vs. ones that work like Facebook.
- bo_Olean 16y agosometimes it feels like we are in illusion about "free" stuffs in internet. Google, Twitter, Flickr, Facebook or whatever.. everything they claim to be free.. they cost your time, they change your mindset, they change the overall you. Nothing is free here, its hardly convincing - yet we just embrace so called free stuffs even without a single thought. More pathetic thing is - these free services don't care who you are - they are just doing their business. what would have been your decision in such situation if you were Twitter Inc, i am just curious ?
- rm445 16y agoOne thing the comments here haven't addressed is how Twitter's behaviour in this case compares with how such things have traditionally been dealt with on the Internet. I think there's a reasonable expectation that big Web companies act in a way compatible with the rest of the Net even if they are for-profit. Consider the Nissan Computer Corporation website: http://www.nissan.com/ http://www.nissan.com/ Or read about when a company called GAIL tried to take gail.com off a woman named Gail: http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2006/d2006-0655.html http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2006/d2006... Now obviously girl-geeks is not a personal nickname, nor apparently was it previously the name of any sort of registered company or other entity, more of an ad-hoc sort of thing. Given that someone later formed a company with this name and trademarked it, should they get the rights to that Twitter name? Would they be able to take girl-geeks.com off a previous owner who was using it in good faith? My suspicion is that they wouldn't, and Twitter's behaviour is bad netiquette.
- VladRussian 16y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_vs._MikeRoweSoft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_vs._MikeRoweSoft