Facebook Sues To Bar the Use of 'Book' in Site's Name

[erich37]

FB actually does not care if anybody else is using the terms "Face" or "Book".

This is just a marketing-stunt of FB in order to show the business-world and the investors-community that FB is serious about making business and defending their brand and business.

FaceBook is working on its IPO and this is just perfect marketing in order to sell their shares highly overpriced.

That´s all.

 

[Peggy]

Can you honestly tell me that you do not believe that the site teachbook was not trying to capture anything with the specific name "TeachBook"? Surely there could have been thousands of other names that would have had nothing to do with Facebook or sound anything like Facebook.

Are you kidding?? "Book" goes hand-in-hand with teaching. So yes, I can honestly say that I do NOT believe that Teachbook was trying to "capture" anything with the name "teachbook".
Why should they have to pick another name??

TBH I hope FB loses their britches over this. They seem to be getting to big for them anyway.

 

[Jethro]

They (TeachBook) are using a likeness of Facebook's name to start up a social website for teachers.
They (teachbook) are trying to cash in on the likeness of the name to attract people.

I think that Facebook has a right to protect its Trademark, its not so much the name but how you use it.

If teachbook was a site to sell teachers books, I doubt facebook would care as much as they do.

I do not necessarily agree with their tactics, but you cannot blame them for protecting them selfs. If you do not actively protect your trademark from what I understand you might be able to loose it.

Let's break this down, and shake it all around.

If I start a site called www.horrorbook.com (no idea if that exists btw) with the by-line "A community for horror literature lovers" how am I breaching Facebook's trademark?

1. "book" is hardly an original idea by FB in any shape or form, if the courts uphold that's a trademark then I would suggest the entire publishing industry is in deep trouble. Expect a number of publishing houses to take their own legal actions since quite a few have the term "book" in their url.

2. I've been running communities for a lot longer on line that Facebook has been in existence, ergo they are actually breaching common definition of the term "community", they have zero intellectual property rights to the term.

Corporate America flexing their muscles, hope teachbook fight them every step of the way and Facebook users finally work out how venal and petty their software company is. In simple terms close your FB account and send a message, already done so. Will pass the article to a number of sites and would suggest everyone do the same, Facebook (the company) are trying bully tactics here and deserve to get a smack in the face for their efforts.

On a forthcoming xen site am going to push the owner to have a forum entitled "Facing the Book" .... discussion of dark age literature, if FB decide to throw their toys out of the playpen then imagine the hit rates

 

[Anthony Parsons]

Can you honestly tell me that you do not believe that the site teachbook was not trying to capture anything with the specific name "TeachBook"?

So should every name containing Xen within it change their name? Citrix have Xen registered for use with computer software. Any use of Xen within the name for computer software could be disputed as watering of the name. Dangerous precedence I think for common words.

 

[Brandon_R]

Jethro, i doubt closing your account would do anything harm to facebook. What's 1000-2000 users leaving going to do to facebook.

 

[David Thomas]

Jethro, i doubt closing your account would do anything harm to facebook. What's 1000-2000 users leaving going to do to facebook.

Not much, unless they spread the news. It can happen. Just because they have 500-million active users now, doesn't mean it's set in stone.

 

[Brandon_R]

Not much, unless they spread the news. It can happen. Just because they have 500-million active users now, doesn't mean it's set in stone.

There will be better things in the future, all there needs to be is an innovative mind to push it forward Facebook is going to be the next myspace

 

[Jethro]

Jethro, i doubt closing your account would do anything harm to facebook. What's 1000-2000 users leaving going to do to facebook.

Depends if it catches on and there's a mass deletion. Wont happen I guess as most people are sheep and the bogan (Chav, redneck in U.S?) element is strong with Facebook.

 

[grant sarver]

By trademarking "Facebook" they apparently believe that gives them the right to any name prefaced by "Face" or suffixed by "book". I'm sure they would extend that to the reverse too. For instance, if I wanted to put up a site called "bookface", I'm sure they would be after me.

 

[EQnoble]

Johannes Gutenberg
the originator of the modern "book" making principles in use today and inventor of the printing press and other things related. I read about this more at Wikipedia and would like to address the first paragraph especially the end...

Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg (c. 1398 – February 3, 1468) was a German goldsmith and printer who introduced modern book printing. His invention of mechanical movable type printing started the Printing Revolution and is widely regarded as the most important event of the modern period.[1] It played a key role in the development of the Renaissance, Reformation and the Scientific Revolution and laid the material basis for the modern knowledge-based economy and the spread of learning to the masses.[2]

With this i suggest that the estate of the Gutenburg's could sue facebook for utilizing the word book taking away from the credit that family deserves for the growth of modern publications as facebook would like to assume they have by including that word in their brand.

And even funnier would be that anyone of roman descent could sue the world and more specifically the gutenburg's for using their invention of writings in a modern "book format" or codex we just renamed it book later but the principle is the same...also quoted from Wikipedia

Whether made from papyrus, parchment, or paper, scrolls were the dominant form of book in the Hellenistic, Roman, Chinese, and Hebrew cultures. The more modern codex book format form took over the Roman world by late antiquity, but the scroll format persisted much longer in Asia.

and the process could continue down to bloodlines of antiquity it's pointless and a waste and they have no legitimate cause here other than to make noise.

 

[Anthony Parsons]

it's pointless and a waste and they have no legitimate cause here other than to make noise.

Corporate bullying tactics... may be more apt than noise.

 

[EQnoble]

Corporate bullying tactics... may be more apt than noise.

I couldn't agree more, that is definitely the proper way to say it, i guess my lingo in casual speaking terms mislead you, bullying is the actual act of what they are doing... but to someone like me who doesn't infringe on anyone's rights and even if your not from where i am you get the same rights as me as long as you breathe 02 and have conscience decision, what they are is white noise in the clarity of life and should be issued a ticket for noise pollution. Very good point you make as the way I put it fell way short of describing exactly the situation in my view so thanks.

 

[crossovernetwork]

reminded of the anecdote about Warner Bros going after the Marx Brothers for using the word 'Casablanca' in their film 'A Night in Casablanca' Groucho wrote back a letter suggesting that he might sue Warners for their use of the word 'Brothers'.