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Don't Say Velcro (2017)

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Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#51

Post by lcnPylGDnU4H9OF »

merelysounds wrote: post #28

Related, Google wrote a blog post[1] on a similar topic in 2006. As far as I know they've successfully avoided genericide and a 2017 lawsuit[2] ended with a ruling in their favor. Also, unsurprisingly, Adobe has a whole section in their trademarks page about photoshopping[3]: > Correct: The image was enhanced with Adobe® Photoshop® Elements software. > Incorrect: The image was photoshopped. [1]: https://googleblog.bl…

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca9/15... (from wikipedia sources)

> plaintiffs have failed to present sufficient evidence in this case to support a jury finding that the relevant public primarily understands the word "google" as a generic name for internet search engines and not as a mark identifying the Google search engine in particular.

I wonder what kind of evidence might actually be used. My lived experience has me telling people that I googled something despite my default search engine being DDG on all of my devices. One can’t really present the myriad spoken conversations which include this use as evidence in court, so what would they do?

Slightly aside: the “correct” examples that are given are always amusing but there’s something about Adobe’s double copyright symbol that hits me harder. That is too funny, not least because they’re 100% serious-face about it.

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#52

Post by fdsalkjlkj »

boringuser2 wrote: post #29
vanviegen wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That may not matter to Velcro (TM). As long as they're publicly making attempts to defend their trademark, perhaps that is enough for them to keep legal rights to it.

It doesn't read like an honest attempt, it reads like a tongue-in-cheek parody of one. Turns out judges used to be lawyers and are pretty good at reading between the lines, too.

[flagged]

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#53

Post by herghost »

Compare with "Prosecco" recently starting an advertising campaign on the London Underground[0] telling people to stop calling whatever generic, non-region protected sparkling wine they're drinking "Prosecco" because Prosecco is DOC protected.

Seems to me (despite the almost certainly valid legal points in the comments here) that the Velcro one is a bit tongue-in-cheek whereas I was slightly taken aback at how direct and earnest the Prosecco one seemed.

Net result will be the same though, I suspect.

[0] https://euroweeklynews.com/2023/12/26/italy-warns-britons-to...

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#54

Post by blagie »

Pro-tip: I work very hard to help make generic the trademarks of corporations I think are evil (and vice-versa for ones I like).

It's a free, cheap, and easy way to fight back.

To the great annoyance of many, I even usually google for things with DuckDuckGo. :)

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#55

Post by notpushkin »

orthoxerox wrote: post #12
bradley13 wrote: post #5

Reminds me of the dark ages, when Xerox was so dominant in the copier market that people used their brand as a noun and a verb. They were threatened with loss of their trademark, because it had become so generic. So they had a massive publicity campaign, asking people to say "copy" instead of "xerox". Is this a uniquely US thing? In the UK, people always say "hoover" instead of "vacuum".

> Is this a uniquely US thing? No, in Russia people have been xerring documents since photocopiers appeared there.

Username checks out, haha.

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#56

Post by chrismorgan »

dathinab wrote: post #31
1f60c wrote: post #19

(2017), according to https://eu.usatoday.com/story/money/2017/09/26/velcros-video... They're trying to avoid genericide. I think if they didn't do this, they could actually lose the trademark .

but can they really stop it? I mean in most cases where a term becomes "generic" it has been long time generic before at some point someone bothers to make a study/lawsuit which declares it as generic as result. For example pretty much everyone I know uses Lego as a generic term and knows about not Lego produced bricks. Currently Lego still managed to defend the trademark but IMHO it's just a matter of time until it…

Yes. Xerox is one example of a company that succeeded with their marketing campaign in a lot of the world. I understand that in Australia one used to xerox documents, but now you certainly photocopy them. In India they still xerox documents.

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#57

Post by boringuser2 »

fdsalkjlkj wrote: post #52
boringuser2 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't read like an honest attempt, it reads like a tongue-in-cheek parody of one. Turns out judges used to be lawyers and are pretty good at reading between the lines, too.

[flagged]

"Ridiculous", really? Does my statement meet the threshold of ridiculous?

Funnily enough, I've never seen a funny legal brief.

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#59

Post by lucasoshiro »

bradley13 wrote: post #5

Reminds me of the dark ages, when Xerox was so dominant in the copier market that people used their brand as a noun and a verb. They were threatened with loss of their trademark, because it had become so generic. So they had a massive publicity campaign, asking people to say "copy" instead of "xerox". Is this a uniquely US thing? In the UK, people always say "hoover" instead of "vacuum".

This happens a lot here in Brazil. Some brands are so famous that they are synonyms of some products, e. g. Gillette (razor blade), Bom Bril (steel wool), Insulfim (window film) and so on.

Xerox is a curious thing here. It is a so strong synonym to photocopy that almost no one remembers that it is a brand (at least, I don't remember seeing in person any Xerox device). It is so strong that xerox also means the shops were the photocopies are made.

Just place Google Maps over São Paulo, search for "xerox" and see what happens

Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)

#60

Post by elmimmo »

Transformers do not transform but convert in Hasbro’s marketing and licensed materials, and strictly speaking they’re not even supposed to be Transformers but Transformers robots (which grammatically is wrong, but alas). Except, for whatever valid reason, inside the fiction, where Transformers becomes a perfectly valid noun they refer themselves with and they do transform, not convert, all day long. I don’t get it.
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