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Most apps back then weren't staffed by hundreds/thousands of people with a giant legal team to enforce trademarks either.

by gochi 3y ago

grishka 3y ago
Yes but there's definitely some kind of "fair use" allowed for trademarks. My own observations show that it's fine for a product to claim it's "for" or "compatible with" someone else's trademarked product. One example is third-party coffee capsules "for Nespresso machines", usually accompanied by "not affiliated with Nespresso". I'm sure Nespresso has an army of lawyers but these things continue to be sold all around the world so it must be legal to do this.
- chipotle_coyote 3y ago
  In that specific case, it's because Nespresso's patent on the capsule design ran out and they can't stop other people from selling compatible capsules anymore. While they still had the patent, they went after third-party capsules pretty aggressively. There is no "fair use" clause for patents or trademarks the way there is for copyright, but patents expire much faster. (Trademarks do, too, although they can be renewed indefinitely -- but you have to do it affirmatively every 10 years in the US.) With the necessary "not a lawyer" disclaimer in place: in the case of Reddit's APIs (or anyone else's), AFAIK the issue wouldn't a trademark or patent issue, per se -- an API can't be patented (or trademarked), and it's debatable whether they can be copyrighted. (A case between Oracle and Google involving Java's APIs made it all the way to the Supreme Court, which kind of punted on making a definitive legal decision as to the copyrightability of APIs.) But, making unauthorized use of them could almost certainly be classified as a breach of contract, e.g., a violation of the end-user license.
- ThatPlayer 3y ago
  This happened to my preferred reddit app: reddit is fun. They changed their name to "rif is fun for reddit". Still want reddit in the name to show up in searches.

Most apps back then weren't staffed by hundreds/thousands of people with a giant legal team to enforce trademarks either.

by gochi 3y ago

Most apps back then weren't staffed by hundreds/thousands of people with a giant legal team to enforce trademarks either.

grishka 3y ago

Yes but there's definitely some kind of "fair use" allowed for trademarks. My own observations show that it's fine for a product to claim it's "for" or "compatible with" someone else's trademarked product. One example is third-party coffee capsules "for Nespresso machines", usually accompanied by "not affiliated with Nespresso". I'm sure Nespresso has an army of lawyers but these things continue to be sold all around the world so it must be legal to do this.

chipotle_coyote 3y ago
In that specific case, it's because Nespresso's patent on the capsule design ran out and they can't stop other people from selling compatible capsules anymore. While they still had the patent, they went after third-party capsules pretty aggressively. There is no "fair use" clause for patents or trademarks the way there is for copyright, but patents expire much faster. (Trademarks do, too, although they can be renewed indefinitely -- but you have to do it affirmatively every 10 years in the US.) With the necessary "not a lawyer" disclaimer in place: in the case of Reddit's APIs (or anyone else's), AFAIK the issue wouldn't a trademark or patent issue, per se -- an API can't be patented (or trademarked), and it's debatable whether they can be copyrighted. (A case between Oracle and Google involving Java's APIs made it all the way to the Supreme Court, which kind of punted on making a definitive legal decision as to the copyrightability of APIs.) But, making unauthorized use of them could almost certainly be classified as a breach of contract, e.g., a violation of the end-user license.
ThatPlayer 3y ago
This happened to my preferred reddit app: reddit is fun. They changed their name to "rif is fun for reddit". Still want reddit in the name to show up in searches.