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CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

clownstrike.lol

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Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#181

Post by arp242 »

tamimio wrote: post #151
arp242 wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is it illegal now to rhyme words Trademarks have always applied anything that could reasonably be confused with it. So yes, it is illegal to rhyme trademarks. But trademarks has also long since allowed for parody and other usage that doesn't harm the trademark owner. That's why it's a nonsense request, not because of the rhyming.

> So yes, it is illegal to rhyme trademarks. Do you have any real life examples of that?

Do you also want me to prove the sky is blue and that sex causes babies? It's trademark basics that it applies to anything that can reasonably be confused with it.

But please, try starting up Goodle Search or Matflix Streaming and let us know how that went for you.

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#182

Post by giltron »

bhartzer wrote: post #65
cortesoft wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you could block "clown" or "strike".

Yes, they could place a domain block on "crowdstrike", and variations of that would be blocked, such as cr0wdstrike, crowdstr1ke, etc.

I doubt it. They are protecting against variations of "crowdstrike"...Not every variation of domains with the word "strike" in it. That would go beyond reasonable.

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#183

Post by alephnerd »

not2b wrote: post #171
darby_nine wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It’s ironic that Crowdstrike could be suffering reputational damage due to a failure mode they didn’t realize existed in the services provided by a vendor they hired to protect them from reputational damage. If you spend enough time around VC's it becomes difficult to imagine how this doesn't happen more often. Many times companies grow too quickly for a clearly seasoned veteran of the market to get a chance to tak…

I think it's going to shift. Airlines in particular are probably going to decide that they can't afford to take another hit like this, and come up with a way to limit the damage if a software update (even from Microsoft) is broken, and come up with a way to test updates before pushing them to all devices.

> come up with a way to test updates before pushing them to all devices

This is SOP for plenty of purchasers already.

Some orgs just don't have the ability to build processes like that.

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#184

Post by tamimio »

arp242 wrote: post #181
tamimio wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So yes, it is illegal to rhyme trademarks. Do you have any real life examples of that?

Do you also want me to prove the sky is blue and that sex causes babies? It's trademark basics that it applies to anything that can reasonably be confused with it. But please, try starting up Goodle Search or Matflix Streaming and let us know how that went for you.

I don’t know why you are getting defensive. I asked a clear question on something that I have little knowledge about, and it seemed you do, so it’s a good chance for you to provide more information or details about the topic. Not everyone here is a trademark lawyer.

That being said, I did a quick search on both “goodle” and “matflix” and I didn’t find any trademark wars or articles about them. However, I did find fully functional sites with these names.

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#185

Post by akira2501 »

arp242 wrote: post #145
tamimio wrote: post #136

Where’s the infringement when the name doesn’t even match?! “Crowdstrike” vs “Clownstrike”? Or is it illegal now to rhyme words? After what happened, that company should be dismantled for good.

> is it illegal now to rhyme words Trademarks have always applied anything that could reasonably be confused with it. So yes, it is illegal to rhyme trademarks. But trademarks has also long since allowed for parody and other usage that doesn't harm the trademark owner. That's why it's a nonsense request, not because of the rhyming.

> anything that could reasonably be confused with it.

Trademarks only apply to _related_ goods and services.

> it is illegal to rhyme trademarks

Not necessarily. The standard is "confusingly similar" or "likelihood of confusion." There are many words and phrases which rhyme incidentally where trademark protection would not apply or where damages would not be granted.

The confusion also has to apply specifically to the brand or the product. If your trademark fails to be associated with either of those things it can be invalidated.

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#186

Post by tyingq »

_heimdall wrote: post #157
batch12 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where they may have messed up is with the use of crowdstrike's branding. I've worked for a company that had a near 100% success rate with taking over domains that used their branding. Not just taking down the site, but taking ownership of the whole domain.

Were any of those success for violation of copyright or trademark when used in parody? I don't know if it would hold up, or how long it would even be between a domain registrar handing it over and having a day in court, but there does seem to be a good case for this being a protected use of CrowdStrike's protected branding.

Untied.com lasted for a a really long time, but did eventually get taken down based on copyright.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Untied.com

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#187

Post by poizan42 »

bhelkey wrote: post #163
rsingel wrote: post #106

Cloudflare's lawyers should have told Crowd strike to kick rocks. The DMCA's copyright provisions apply only to copyrighted content not trademarks. Cloudflare could have told these clowns to go kick rocks without incurring any liability and could have threatened them with filing fake DMCA claims.

> Cloudflare could have told these clowns to go kick rocks without incurring any liability If Cloudflair didn't remove the content and the content was infringing they could lose their safe harbor protections [1]. In this case the website is obviously parody. This highlights the problems with DMCA. Fraudulent DMCA requests incur cost but are almost never penalized. [1] https://www.dmca.com/FAQ/What-is-a-DMCA-Takedown

Not if the DMCA takedown notice wasn't valid in the first place.

(By valid I mean it correctly follows the requirements in the DMCA, one of them being that it must be for copyright. It does not apply to other kinds of IP, nor does it apply to other violations of the DMCA such as the anti-circumvention provision cough youtube-dl cough)

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#188

Post by defrost »

arp242 wrote: post #181
tamimio wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So yes, it is illegal to rhyme trademarks. Do you have any real life examples of that?

Do you also want me to prove the sky is blue and that sex causes babies? It's trademark basics that it applies to anything that can reasonably be confused with it. But please, try starting up Goodle Search or Matflix Streaming and let us know how that went for you.

Mat Goodle and Katie Perry might want to weigh in on that:

Katy Perry v Katie Perry: Singer loses trademark battle

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-65421964

Re: CrowdStrike representatives issue trademark infringement notice to ClownStrike

#190

Post by tgsovlerkhgsel »

diego_sandoval wrote: post #98
new299 wrote: post #10

I wonder to what extent companies consider the reputational damage these kinds of enforcement actions cause. I recently came across this when googling for information on a small Biotech startup: https://udrp.adr.eu/decisions/detail?id=65fab3e46fc02956a010... Will probably be the first thing I remember when I hear their name.

Mr. Scipio had to provide evidence, lose his privacy and justify his use of the domain name to avoid losing it. That is enough proof to conclude that this UDRP thing is deeply unfair and should not exist. "First come, first served" is much more fair than this "burden of proof falls on the defendant" nonsense. We'll have to replace ICANN with something better at some point.

UDRP is meant to address obvious, intentional, malicious domain squatting, where someone registers a domain with your trademark and then extorts you for it.

I believe it serves that purpose reasonably well.

There are three criteria that ALL have to be met (1. identical or confusingly similar to your trademark, 2. registrant doesn't have a legitimate reason, 3. registered/used in bad faith). In cases where these are met, it's pretty clear that the owner should be losing the domain.

I think it would make sense to add a rule that someone who issues a spurious UDRP request should be required to pay the domain holder some default amount of compensation for the hassle, but overall, I think this is a process that makes the Internet better, not worse.

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