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Pulling over my comments on the matter from Inbound.org. Anji mentions a partnership in his post that I wanted to put come context behind. > When Anji reached

Pulling over my comments on the matter from Inbound.org. Anji mentions a partnership in his post that I wanted to put come context behind. > When Anji reached out to us initially, they were CapSEO. At the time, I had no idea Doz existed, or that CapSEO was rebranding. As Anji and I talked, the discussion was around the functionality of CapSEO, which I saw as complementary. Later the discussion moved to their plans to rebrand to Doz, with a fuller focus on inbound marketing services (and software). This too is complementary, but not with the brand of Doz, as Sarah alluded to. There's obvious confusion and brand dilution of Moz that can come as a result, and it's our duty to protect our trademark. I think it's important to have this context. It feel into our lap with no other option than the action we took, we didn't seek this out. We've taken every step to be transparent into why, and hope, still, that we can resolve this in a civilized manner. I've spent the past 8 years of my life doing startups, the last thing we want to do is derail a startup from their mission.

unreal37 13y ago
I think this blog post, and some of the facts that seem to be missing from it (as Andrew outlined above), shows that doz.com is trying to get people on their side without being entirely transparent. Which is a shame. Their argument dilutes when the moz.com people can come out with significant corrections to the facts. That said, come on - moz.com (which you JUST changed to) and doz.com? I think you had other options than the "we're going to cancel your trademark" route.
rooshdi 13y ago
Mozilla could give the same obvious confusion and brand dilution argument you're making for Moz, but they're not.
- masklinn 13y ago
  Even more so because moz's boss is on record citing Mozilla (and DMOZ, which got it name because it originally was Directory.MOZilla.org) as source of the MOZ part of the original SEOmoz. Part which is now the only thing left: http://moz.com/blog/what-does-the-moz-in-seomoz-mean http://moz.com/blog/what-does-the-moz-in-seomoz-mean
examancer 13y ago
I love the outpouring of empathy in the language of responses from Moz. Too bad at the end the end you still decide to stick to your guns and assert there is "obvious confusion and brand dilution". Really?!? Are you really supporting the idea that potential customers of Moz, who go out in search of Moz and stumble on Doz, would confuse the two? Sure, they share two out of three letters, but they don't sound the same (no risk of a misspelling leading to Doz) or look the same. It doesn't appear at all the that Doz is trying to conflate their brand to cause confusion or imply a relationship. My guess is a company like Doz doesn't have the resources to fight, but they should. I can't imagine a court agreeing that even a "moron in a hurry" would confuse the two. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_moron_in_a_hurry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_moron_in_a_hurry
- aetimmes 13y ago
  >Are you really supporting the idea that potential customers of Moz, who go out in search of Moz and stumble on Doz, would confuse the two? With a Hamming distance of one between the names, why wouldn't this be plausible?
  - rhizome 13y ago
    I don't know the statistical term for it, but the letters are on opposite sides of a QWERTY keyboard.
    - eridius 13y ago
      Which would matter if we were talking about likelihood of typos, but we're not.
      - rhizome 13y ago
        Typosquatting has a larger legal footprint in copyright cases than Hamming distance, of which I can find no references. I'm not saying that typosquatting is happening here, but I would guess that typosquatting decisions would come to bear here well before HD did.
MartinCron 13y ago
There's obvious confusion and brand dilution of Moz that can come as a result, and it's our duty to protect our trademark I just can't agree with this assertion. There is not a legitimate fear that you're going to lose trademark protection just because someone is using a similar (but obviously different) name. This isn't the same thing as Xerox or Kleenex turning into a general noun, this is just shameful bullying.
- andrewdumont 13y ago
  It's not a fear, it's a legal obligation. If we don't protect our trademark in instances like this, where we are aware of infringement, we can be legally estopped from protecting our trademark in future cases.
  - chopsueyar 13y ago
    Sorry you are taking so much crap from everybody on HN here. We may not like current IP laws in the US, but they are the current IP laws in the US. I agree with your reasoning.
  - pbreit 13y ago
    I see people cite this concern but have never actually seen any evidence. Since it sounds ridiculous, I'd like to see some decent support for such a contention. Keep in mind, we're talking about a service name that many legitimately feel is sufficiently different.
  - examancer 13y ago
    Are you really trying to assert that by not going after doz for having a vaguely close name in the same industry you would no longer be able to protect yourself from egregious misuse of your mark? By not canceling doz's trademark you would be prevented from going after a hypothetical Mozz, who attempts to pass themselves off as moz by using similar branding and product offerings? You and I, and your lawyer, all know that is complete fantasy. Yes, not going after doz may prevent you from going after similar companies who aren't really infringing your mark anyways... but you would still be fully able to litigate against companies trying to confuse your customers.
crygin 13y ago
> with no other option than the action we took What a strange thing to lie about. Btw, how long after Capseo's purchase of doz.com did SEOmoz file the intent-to-use on MOZ? It's more of a moral question than a legal one.

unreal37 13y ago

I think this blog post, and some of the facts that seem to be missing from it (as Andrew outlined above), shows that doz.com is trying to get people on their side without being entirely transparent. Which is a shame. Their argument dilutes when the moz.com people can come out with significant corrections to the facts. That said, come on - moz.com (which you JUST changed to) and doz.com? I think you had other options than the "we're going to cancel your trademark" route.

rooshdi 13y ago

Mozilla could give the same obvious confusion and brand dilution argument you're making for Moz, but they're not.

masklinn 13y ago
Even more so because moz's boss is on record citing Mozilla (and DMOZ, which got it name because it originally was Directory.MOZilla.org) as source of the MOZ part of the original SEOmoz. Part which is now the only thing left: http://moz.com/blog/what-does-the-moz-in-seomoz-mean http://moz.com/blog/what-does-the-moz-in-seomoz-mean

examancer 13y ago

I love the outpouring of empathy in the language of responses from Moz. Too bad at the end the end you still decide to stick to your guns and assert there is "obvious confusion and brand dilution". Really?!? Are you really supporting the idea that potential customers of Moz, who go out in search of Moz and stumble on Doz, would confuse the two? Sure, they share two out of three letters, but they don't sound the same (no risk of a misspelling leading to Doz) or look the same. It doesn't appear at all the that Doz is trying to conflate their brand to cause confusion or imply a relationship. My guess is a company like Doz doesn't have the resources to fight, but they should. I can't imagine a court agreeing that even a "moron in a hurry" would confuse the two. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_moron_in_a_hurry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_moron_in_a_hurry

aetimmes 13y ago
>Are you really supporting the idea that potential customers of Moz, who go out in search of Moz and stumble on Doz, would confuse the two? With a Hamming distance of one between the names, why wouldn't this be plausible?
- rhizome 13y ago
  I don't know the statistical term for it, but the letters are on opposite sides of a QWERTY keyboard.
  - eridius 13y ago
    Which would matter if we were talking about likelihood of typos, but we're not.
    - rhizome 13y ago
      Typosquatting has a larger legal footprint in copyright cases than Hamming distance, of which I can find no references. I'm not saying that typosquatting is happening here, but I would guess that typosquatting decisions would come to bear here well before HD did.

MartinCron 13y ago

There's obvious confusion and brand dilution of Moz that can come as a result, and it's our duty to protect our trademark I just can't agree with this assertion. There is not a legitimate fear that you're going to lose trademark protection just because someone is using a similar (but obviously different) name. This isn't the same thing as Xerox or Kleenex turning into a general noun, this is just shameful bullying.

andrewdumont 13y ago
It's not a fear, it's a legal obligation. If we don't protect our trademark in instances like this, where we are aware of infringement, we can be legally estopped from protecting our trademark in future cases.
- chopsueyar 13y ago
  Sorry you are taking so much crap from everybody on HN here. We may not like current IP laws in the US, but they are the current IP laws in the US. I agree with your reasoning.
- pbreit 13y ago
  I see people cite this concern but have never actually seen any evidence. Since it sounds ridiculous, I'd like to see some decent support for such a contention. Keep in mind, we're talking about a service name that many legitimately feel is sufficiently different.
- examancer 13y ago
  Are you really trying to assert that by not going after doz for having a vaguely close name in the same industry you would no longer be able to protect yourself from egregious misuse of your mark? By not canceling doz's trademark you would be prevented from going after a hypothetical Mozz, who attempts to pass themselves off as moz by using similar branding and product offerings? You and I, and your lawyer, all know that is complete fantasy. Yes, not going after doz may prevent you from going after similar companies who aren't really infringing your mark anyways... but you would still be fully able to litigate against companies trying to confuse your customers.

crygin 13y ago

> with no other option than the action we took What a strange thing to lie about. Btw, how long after Capseo's purchase of doz.com did SEOmoz file the intent-to-use on MOZ? It's more of a moral question than a legal one.