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Apple seeks to trademark “startup” in Australia
- ateeqs 13y agoApple can go suck a lemon.
- levosmetalo 13y agoDo we really need that kind of comments here on HN?
- nsmartt 13y agoI'm told that no one cares whether Apple is shady because they build quality products, but I really want to see a shift away from Apple products in protest of said shadiness. edit: clarity
- drylight 13y agoPlease don't say Linux.
- dylangs1030 13y agoLinux has come a long way.
- rozap 13y agoSpoken like someone who hasn't used Linux in the past decade.
- obiterdictum 13y agoI have been using it full-time circa 2006-2009. I guess that counts as "past decade". 1. There was no out of the box support of my particular NVidia video card, so I've had to build the driver from source and fiddle with my system to install it. 2. I've had userspace processes freeze on network activities and become impossible to kill, because of a kernel deadlock in my wireless driver. 3. Proper smooth fonts required work at the time (freetype did not ship with good subpixel hinting). 4. Proprietary media codecs did not work out of the box and required a third-party repositories. 5. The whole KDE four-point-not-really-zero debacle. A minimalistic XMonad+Vim+terminal setup was decent and worked for me, but eventually I got sick of desktop Linux and moved to OSX. I realise that many things have been fixed in the meantime, but it was not a flawless experience back then. If I was to give desktop Linux another shot today, I'd be cautiously optimistic, but not expect a miracle.
- ekianjo 13y agoAs you said many things happened in the meantime and you should not stay on your 2009 impressions. Besides, Please mention the distribution you used, there is no "single Linux Experience", just like you don't compare Windows 8 and windows XP as being a single brand of "Windows". For your particular comments: 1. Not an issue anymore in most recent distributions, and Nvidia is now supporting even the latest graphics cards on Linux. 2.3. I can't comment on that. 4. On Ubuntu and many other distros they now work out of the box.
- josteink 13y agoLinux is actually not half bad nowadays. It's not 2001 anymore. I've migrated my main laptop from Windows 8 to Elementary OS and the only complaint from my very non-technical SO is that things "are different" (i.e. the close button is in upper left corner of the window). Apart from that, everything just works. In fact it all worked out of the box, with the noticable exception of Skype. Linux is turning into a pretty viable option. Really.
- elnate 13y agoThings like the close button position irk me quite a lot. Are there ways to make it look as simliar as possible to win7?
- BitMastro 13y agoThere are ways, but maybe KDE is a better alternative
- dkersten 13y agoOf course there are. It is the forever configurable Linux after all. But since the discussion was about Apple products having the close button on the left is a benefit ;-) But really these things are frustrations at first but you will learn the differences and get over them very very quickly. Just ask anyone who switched from win to osx.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- hdra 13y agoSay one thing OS X does objectively better than Linux. I honestly can't think of any.
- adamnemecek 13y agoLaptop battery life.
- kleiba 13y agoMultiple screen support.
- snikolic 13y agoAs someone using OS X over Linux because of monitor-related reasons, I actually think Ubuntu supports multiple displays better than OS X.
- eropple 13y agoIME, Linux has a long way to go for non-dual-head setups. I have four monitors with different geometries on two graphics cards on a Hackintosh and OS X handles it seamlessly. Ubuntu pukes hard and dies (or, almost as bad, just ignores monitors) when it can't figure out how it should handle them all in a single X session.
- thomasmeeks 13y agoA single X session cannot span two graphics cards. X just doesn't support it. You're waiting on Mir or Wayland for that one. If you manage to get all four monitors on one card somehow, X can handle the multiple geometries just fine. Though it will generally do a terrible job of automatically detecting the right resolution. Love Linux, but this bit does disappoint.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
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- rimantas 13y agoAs if there is anything not shady. Just definition of shady vary among the people.
- adamnemecek 13y agoWhat does this comment even mean? Questioning semantics to undermine the parent comment's argument? Quaint strategy.
- rimantas 13y agoThat commen means: you can take any company and find that its practices are shady. Nobody questions semantics. You think Apple is shady, I think Google is no less shady, maybe more, given their business model.
- adamnemecek 13y agoWell this interpretation is roughly on par. How does the fact that Google might employ shady practices as well really add anything to the discussion? Does that absolve Apple from any wrongdoings?
- bananamansion 13y agowe'll just start calling it "startdown" we're in australia afterall.
- personlurking 13y agoI was thinking "startupside-down". This news is right up there with the big tech companies trying to grab .book, .search, etc
- ohwp 13y agoAt first I thought it was a joke. Then I read the article... This is one of the reasons why I never buy something from Apple. I think they are bad for our creativity.
- pavanred 13y agoIf only they spent all that time and money they spend on lawyers on R&D and developing new products instead...
- rimantas 13y agoWhat would happen then? MS spends lots more money on R&D, does it matter?
- m4x 13y agoThe article doesn't really comment on why Apple would actually want to trademark the word 'startup'. As far as I know it isn't used as part of their marketing anywhere. Can anybody here offer some insight?
- pavlov 13y agoThe trademark application shown in the article offers a hint. The categories listed include "retail store services", "maintenance, installation and repair of computer hardware", "technical support services". It sounds like Startup will be a service offered in Apple retail stores, similar to the Genius Bar.
- skeletonjelly 13y agoAustralia doesn't seem to be the typical testing ground though for Apple. Why now?
- itafroma 13y agoIt's not clear yet what the trademark is for, but you generally don't need a product or service on the market for a trademark application to go through, just an intent to use it. TUAW speculates that the trademark is for some as-yet-unannounced retail program: http://www.tuaw.com/2011/04/24/apple-files-trademark-for-startup-retail-store-program/ http://www.tuaw.com/2011/04/24/apple-files-trademark-for-sta...
- namenotrequired 13y agoI was in the Apple store in Amsterdam earlier this summer and saw a large sign saying "STARTUP" on one wall. At first I was confused, thinking of startup companies, but then I realised it seemed more like a place where they help people get started with their new devices.
- jacques_chester 13y agoTrademarks are not global variables. They are scoped. In trademark law these are called "classes". If I have a trademark for McDonalds that covers navigation equipment, then the hamburger company can't sue me using their trademark which covers hamburgers. The coverage is scoped. Now! Observe the list of classes -- 37, 38, 41 and 42. Apple is essentially registering "startup" to cover devices, their maintenance, development and training. Not all uses of "startup" ever. Just those uses attached to what Apple produces.
- grabeh 13y agoThe owner of a mark with a sufficient reputation can take action against dissimilar goods and services where they're riding on the goodwill of the mark of course so TMs are not completely limited to their classes. Rolex could sue me if used their marks on a good which they weren't registered in if I was trying to take unfair advantage of their mark, tractors for example. Whilst it's highly unlikely in this case that Apple would, I think it's inappropriate to seek protection of the term in the first place, at least from a PR perspective and from the risk of trade mark creep.
- jacques_chester 13y agoGranted, but I don't think "startup" is a sufficiently distinct brand to be taken advantage of. But thankyou for the correction.
- grabeh 13y agoI agree however looking forwards the brand could grow sufficiently large to gain this enhanced protection. I think even if this did happen Apple would be unlikely to enforce overly harshly but their stance on the App Store mark goes some way to show their approach to TM enforcement (though the discussion over the distinctiveness is another discussion!)
- wisty 13y agoIn Australia, McDonalds lost a case when they tried to stop McWilliams selling a "Big Mac" 2 litre bottle of wine, because no-one would mistake it for a hamburger. (http://www.internationallawoffice.com/newsletters/detail.aspx?g=d30cba2f-38ce-448b-99f5-e0329cacfb1f http://www.internationallawoffice.com/newsletters/detail.asp...)
- itafroma 13y agoI think it's important to stress that trademarks are not copyrights or patents: assuming Apple's trademark application goes through, the protection on the mark is good only for the goods and services they specified in the application (edit: with a caveat mentioned by grabeh elsewhere[1]): > Retail store services featuring computers, computer software, computer peripherals, mobile phones, and consumer electronic devices, and demonstration of products relating thereto Based on that, this looks to be a new retail service they plan on offering called "Startup". Edit: Also note that in 2011, Apple already applied for the Startup trademark in the US and China with the same international registration number: http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2011/04/apple-files-for-mission-control-and-all-new-startup-trademarks.html http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2011/04/apple-fi... As far as I can tell from the action on the trademark application[2], it was granted a preliminary trademark (which is standard practice) and was opened up to objections: at least one was raised, and the USPTO has now passed it to Apple to respond. It looks like they have until September 20th to do so[3]. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288395 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288395 [2]: http://www.trademarkia.com/startup-85296886.html http://www.trademarkia.com/startup-85296886.html [3]: http://trademarks.justia.com/852/96/startup-85296886.html http://trademarks.justia.com/852/96/startup-85296886.html
- chmike 13y agoI thought it was not allowed to trade mark common words like car, plane, etc. And startup seams a common word, well in our community.
- Sagat 13y agoIn other news, Google trademarks the color blue. Smurf village foreclosed.
- b1daly 13y agoIt's hard to believe that Apple could get this through in the US given the amount of live marks with the word STARTUP. Over 50 results! I have been working on a trademark application that was rejected preliminary basis on the grounds of "likelihood of confusion." (My mark is HOTKEY MATRIX for a hardware controller of audio software, the existing mark is HOT KEYS for "Computer Software program for playback of digital audio by touching computer screen.) I was a little shocked when I delved into the various rulings how byzantine and nuanced the judgements are. Since the core issue is the potential for likeliness of confusion on the part of a consumer, each case is supposed to be judged on its own. If your into this kind of thing here's the discussion on the US "Trademark Manual of Examining Procedure." http://tmep.uspto.gov/RDMS/detail/manual/TMEP/Apr2013/d1e2.xml#/manual/TMEP/Apr2013/TMEP-1200d1e5036.xml http://tmep.uspto.gov/RDMS/detail/manual/TMEP/Apr2013/d1e2.x... I wonder if there is some strategy by which getting registration in other countries helps with getting US registration.