4 ms·

The frustrating thing about this for me is that I liked Get Satisfaction. It's a really well-done site, for the most part, and it was easy and convenient. I h

The frustrating thing about this for me is that I liked Get Satisfaction. It's a really well-done site, for the most part, and it was easy and convenient. I had never used it deeply, and only for services that were actually using it as their primary support channel, so I didn't even realize that they had pages for companies that hadn't signed up with them. All the GS pages look pretty much identical, save for a few logos. After a while, you blow past the repeated boilerplate on each page, and you just use the functionality. I was one of the people who would never have noticed the small distinctions between official and unofficial; I would have thought any GS page was sanctioned by the company, because frankly, it never would have even entered my mind that GS would so brazenly try to unilaterally pose as a company's support channel. This is exactly the kind of thing that trademarks are intended to protect against. I hate to say it, but all the hand-wringing over whether 37s was being rude by dropping a bomb of a blog post, is kind of silly. It could have very legitimately been a bomb of a lawsuit.

jerf 18y ago
"It could have very legitimately been a bomb of a lawsuit." I agree, there's a very strong case for a trademark lawsuit. What's more, I think I can almost guarantee that some other company will file a lawsuit if Get Satisfaction doesn't clean up their act. And I'd bet on whoever files the lawsuit, too. This is quite clearly trademark infringement, from my non-lawyer-but-spent-time-studying-this point of view.
- geebee 18y ago
  Some people actually need to lose, big, in order to gain introspection. I remember Steven King on NPR talking about the guy who badly injured him in a car accident. He was frustrated that the courts were lenient, because he said the guy continued to seem in denial about the connection between his actions and the damage he had caused. Apparently, this guy had a history of reckless driving (Steven King had been walking on the side of the road when he was hit), but he continued to view these accidents as bad luck, circumstance, things happen, and so forth. When asked what he wanted to see from the courts, Steven King said he wasn't looking for vengeance, but he wanted to see the guy placed into a situation where he'd be forced to finally confront his actions and fully acknowledge his role in the damage he had caused. Now, obviously GetSatisfaction is not guilty of something as serious as physical harm. But I still hear the same lack of introspection, the same denial, that I think Steve King was referring to. They are still calling this a "learning experience", an "error", something to "discuss and improve on." Their tone alternates between defensive, accusatory, and chirpy. This shows a complete lack of introspection and self-awareness. It's alien to most, but some people require a true legal defeat to develop introspection, something that strips away every final defense and puts them in a position where they have no recourse but to truly and deeply acknowledge their behavior. As long as 37Signals engages with these folks in a blog vs blog thing, they're going to see this as a he said, she said, where there are good points to be made on each side. Personally, I don't get any indication they recognize how manipulative, deceptive, and wrong their actions really are.

jerf 18y ago

"It could have very legitimately been a bomb of a lawsuit." I agree, there's a very strong case for a trademark lawsuit. What's more, I think I can almost guarantee that some other company will file a lawsuit if Get Satisfaction doesn't clean up their act. And I'd bet on whoever files the lawsuit, too. This is quite clearly trademark infringement, from my non-lawyer-but-spent-time-studying-this point of view.

geebee 18y ago
Some people actually need to lose, big, in order to gain introspection. I remember Steven King on NPR talking about the guy who badly injured him in a car accident. He was frustrated that the courts were lenient, because he said the guy continued to seem in denial about the connection between his actions and the damage he had caused. Apparently, this guy had a history of reckless driving (Steven King had been walking on the side of the road when he was hit), but he continued to view these accidents as bad luck, circumstance, things happen, and so forth. When asked what he wanted to see from the courts, Steven King said he wasn't looking for vengeance, but he wanted to see the guy placed into a situation where he'd be forced to finally confront his actions and fully acknowledge his role in the damage he had caused. Now, obviously GetSatisfaction is not guilty of something as serious as physical harm. But I still hear the same lack of introspection, the same denial, that I think Steve King was referring to. They are still calling this a "learning experience", an "error", something to "discuss and improve on." Their tone alternates between defensive, accusatory, and chirpy. This shows a complete lack of introspection and self-awareness. It's alien to most, but some people require a true legal defeat to develop introspection, something that strips away every final defense and puts them in a position where they have no recourse but to truly and deeply acknowledge their behavior. As long as 37Signals engages with these folks in a blog vs blog thing, they're going to see this as a he said, she said, where there are good points to be made on each side. Personally, I don't get any indication they recognize how manipulative, deceptive, and wrong their actions really are.