No problem in France - the generic term for Velcro here is 'scratch'.
Many people in France say velcro though.
Don't Say Velcro (2017)
71–80 of 175 posts
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#72Related, 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…
> Correct: The image was enhanced with Adobe® Photoshop® Elements software. Dumb question: how would you pronounce this if you were saying it ? Specifically the ® symbol ?
Unicode's name for it is REGISTERED SIGN. It's usually silent when part of a brand name, though.
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#73I'm not a lawyer, and I'm confused.
Do they lose their trademark if it gets used generically, or if they don't try to prevent that? Because common sense would imply the former, but then this video would just be a big admission that they already lost, no?
"Everywhere you go, you see this scratchy, hairy fastener and you say 'Hey, that's velcro!'"
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#74Related, 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.…
Law is weird, but in real life people use google as a verb meaning "search on the internet" every single time. When a public figure says something like "look it up on Google" instead of "google it" (and you an almost hear the © in the former), that almost always means they've been in long talks with Google representatives about an ad campaign and they urged the speaker to not use the brand as a verb.
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
"R in circle". Just like copyright is "C in circle".
I can just imagine actors on some TV show saying this because the corporate sponsors demanded 'correct usage'.
In Ren & Stimpy comics, Powdered Toast Man always referred to the product for which he was named as Powdered Toast® or Powdered Toast™. I always took that as a hint that he pronounced the marks somehow.
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#76Reminds 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".
In Brazil it is still used as a photocopy term (much easier to say "tirar uma xerox" than "tirar uma fotocópia").
Other common terms that we use that came from brands:
shaving razor -> gilete (instead of "lâmina de barbear")
chewing gum -> chiclete (instead of "goma de mascar")
cotton swab -> cotonete (a J&J brand, instead of "haste flexível")
polystyrene -> isopor (a Knauf brand, instead of "esferovite" or "poliestireno expandido")
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#77Reminds 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".
In France many trademarks became generic names: Frigidaire and its abbreviated form frigo is the standard name for a refrigerator (nobody ever says "réfrigérateur"). Kleenex is the standard word meaning "paper handkerchief". Sopalin is the standard word for "roll of paper towels". Many automotive parts are called from a brand name too : "Delco" is the only name an igniter is ever called; a flexible black tube is alwa…
Escalator was a trademark registered by Otis, the company that made those stairs-go-up devices: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generic_and_genericize...
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#78Compare 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…
I think the two videos from Velcro really hit the right spot between fun and educational.
I started watching the first video with a large amount of skepticism (soulless company paying millions to create viral video about something I couldn't care less about), but I really couldn't help but like both the videos and the company itself more now. Well done, I guess.
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#79I'm not a lawyer, and I'm confused. Do they lose their trademark if it gets used generically, or if they don't try to prevent that? Because common sense would imply the former, but then this video would just be a big admission that they already lost, no? "Everywhere you go, you see this scratchy, hairy fastener and you say 'Hey, that's velcro!'"
You lose the right to defend your trademark if you don't make an effort to defend your trademark.
If 3M comes out with their own hook-and-loop fastener and calls it "3M Velcro", the court would say "you can't sue 3M over this since you clearly don't care when people say Velcro". This whole video is just to establish precedent.
Re: Don't Say Velcro (2017)
#80Reminds 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".
I think the "defend it or lose it" nature of trademarks may be a US wrinkle, but I'm not sure.
During the 90s, Nintendo popularized the use of the term "game console" to avoid people's moms calling their competitors "Nintendos". Like Atari before them, their name had become synonymous with video games in general, something they wanted to avoid in order to protect their trademark.
There are references to "consoles" before this happened, dating back to the early 80s, but in everyday language most kids called them "video game systems" or by their brand names (Atari, Nintendo, Sega, etc.).