5 ms·

A lot of people are talking about how this guys doesn't understand Trademark law. Well, no shit. This conference stole his identity. He isn't claiming he has a

by socrates1998 12y ago

A lot of people are talking about how this guys doesn't understand Trademark law. Well, no shit. This conference stole his identity. He isn't claiming he has a right to the name. What the conference did was legal, but still not right. All too typical of people trying to build themselves up in status. They knew about this guy and they then they checked to see if he trademarked it. They knew they were legally okay, so they went ahead with it. Legal move, but a dick move.

codemaster3000 12y ago
Agreed. Not sure why the top post ITT is a rant about copyright law vs trademark laws. @futurestack never claimed legal rights to the name, he's just saying that what New Relic did was a total dick move.
viggity 12y ago
Agreed. In the word of "the dude" - "You're not wrong, Walter, you're just an asshole". Asshole is probably too harsh a word, but considering that "futurestack" was already taken as a domain and as a twitter account and both were in active use and related to technology, naming your conference "futurestack" seems a bit lame. Perhaps they could have done more to communicate what the official domain / twitter accounts were. (i.e. make them more prominent)
- futurestack 12y ago
  First smile I've had all day.
x1798DE 12y ago
I don't really see it as a dick move. They're not appropriating this guy's brand or pretending to be him. The worst that's happened so far is he got a few tweets not meant for him. He's not going to lose any business or reputation because a conference has the same name as him. He already owns the .com domain and has the twitter account for the name. I could see if they tried to make some move to steal his domain by trying to vulture a lapsed renewal, or sent him a C&D for use of the name, but basically their big crime was to have chosen the same name for their developer conference as he uses as his internet handle, and maybe they knew there was some guy who uses the same name. Name collisions are going to happen. There are a limited number of cool names. If it's not causing any real problems, then I don't see the big issue. That said, if I accidentally caused some guy to get a bunch of tweets not meant for him, I'd probably apologize about it privately (obviously it wasn't intentional). I definitely would try to talk to the guy before trying to get his twitter account suspended.
- socrates1998 12y ago
  Let me ask you this. Would you be annoyed/angry if someone took your twitter handle and primary domain name and started using it as their own? If though you are very active and controlled that name for a number of years? Almost everyone would be angry (or very annoyed). There are a limitless number of names out there. Here is why it is a dick move. 1) They almost for sure knew about him and his name. 2) They didn't contact him or offer to buy out his domain/handle. 3) They went ahead with it anyways probably because he hadn't trademarked it. Look it's not the end of the world, it's just a pretty shitty thing to do to a person.
  - x1798DE 12y ago
    If someone tried to take over my twitter handle and domain name, I would be upset. If someone used the same name that I am using for an internet nickname for myself (a person) for their company, I would essentially not care. At worst I'd be annoyed at an increased number of "@" mentions that comes from there being namespace collision. And, frankly, this happens all the time. There is a ton of name collision out there happening as names which are sufficiently unique for a local context get moved online, which is a global context. Generally, when people find out there's been some name confusion, they are mildly annoyed by the inconvenience of people "@" messaging the wrong account, but not indignant that someone dared use the same name as them. Mostly when I see this happen I see people getting upset about the people "@" messaging them not checking the name more carefully, not at the company for picking the name. That is a pretty strong indicator, to me, that most people wouldn't consider this a "dick move".

codemaster3000 12y ago

Agreed. Not sure why the top post ITT is a rant about copyright law vs trademark laws. @futurestack never claimed legal rights to the name, he's just saying that what New Relic did was a total dick move.

viggity 12y ago

Agreed. In the word of "the dude" - "You're not wrong, Walter, you're just an asshole". Asshole is probably too harsh a word, but considering that "futurestack" was already taken as a domain and as a twitter account and both were in active use and related to technology, naming your conference "futurestack" seems a bit lame. Perhaps they could have done more to communicate what the official domain / twitter accounts were. (i.e. make them more prominent)

futurestack 12y ago
First smile I've had all day.

x1798DE 12y ago

I don't really see it as a dick move. They're not appropriating this guy's brand or pretending to be him. The worst that's happened so far is he got a few tweets not meant for him. He's not going to lose any business or reputation because a conference has the same name as him. He already owns the .com domain and has the twitter account for the name. I could see if they tried to make some move to steal his domain by trying to vulture a lapsed renewal, or sent him a C&D for use of the name, but basically their big crime was to have chosen the same name for their developer conference as he uses as his internet handle, and maybe they knew there was some guy who uses the same name. Name collisions are going to happen. There are a limited number of cool names. If it's not causing any real problems, then I don't see the big issue. That said, if I accidentally caused some guy to get a bunch of tweets not meant for him, I'd probably apologize about it privately (obviously it wasn't intentional). I definitely would try to talk to the guy before trying to get his twitter account suspended.

socrates1998 12y ago
Let me ask you this. Would you be annoyed/angry if someone took your twitter handle and primary domain name and started using it as their own? If though you are very active and controlled that name for a number of years? Almost everyone would be angry (or very annoyed). There are a limitless number of names out there. Here is why it is a dick move. 1) They almost for sure knew about him and his name. 2) They didn't contact him or offer to buy out his domain/handle. 3) They went ahead with it anyways probably because he hadn't trademarked it. Look it's not the end of the world, it's just a pretty shitty thing to do to a person.
- x1798DE 12y ago
  If someone tried to take over my twitter handle and domain name, I would be upset. If someone used the same name that I am using for an internet nickname for myself (a person) for their company, I would essentially not care. At worst I'd be annoyed at an increased number of "@" mentions that comes from there being namespace collision. And, frankly, this happens all the time. There is a ton of name collision out there happening as names which are sufficiently unique for a local context get moved online, which is a global context. Generally, when people find out there's been some name confusion, they are mildly annoyed by the inconvenience of people "@" messaging the wrong account, but not indignant that someone dared use the same name as them. Mostly when I see this happen I see people getting upset about the people "@" messaging them not checking the name more carefully, not at the company for picking the name. That is a pretty strong indicator, to me, that most people wouldn't consider this a "dick move".