'Urban Homesteading' Trademarked, Lots Of Urban Homesteaders Told To Cease Using The Common Term
from the homestead-bullying dept
Melissa McEwen was the first of a few of you to send in variations on the story of how a Pasadena-based family, the Dervaes, were able to get a trademark on the term "urban homesteading," last year, and recently have been sending out letters telling people to stop using the term and getting Facebook groups to shut down. Of course, "urban homesteading" is a term that's been in widespread use for years, and to suddenly claim ownership of it is pretty ridiculous and is a classic case of trademark bullying. The family is defending its actions by claiming, first of all, that the letters it sends out are perfectly friendly and do not contain the phrase "cease & desist." Of course, you don't have to actually include that phrase, and the letter pretty clearly states that no one else can use the term "urban homesteading." Instead, it suggests "it would be proper to use generic terms to replace the registered trademark you are using." Yes, this is friendlier than your ordinary legal nastygram... but it's still a form of a cease and desist.The family has also posted a separate blog post which purports to teach "trademark basics," but it appears the family might need a refresher course. It notes, correctly, that the same phrase can be used separately in unrelated fields. However, given that's the case, it also means that its letter claiming that no one else can use the phrase urban homesteading is wrong. And that's a big part of the complaint. It seems clear that the family is not just going after those who have used the phrase in a confusing manner, but all sorts of folks who were using the phrase that was in widespread common usage well before the family got the trademark on the name...
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Filed Under: trademark, urban homesteading
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I wonder what...
I also wonder if the authors of those books could combat the trademark, since they used the term for written media first.
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Re: I wonder what...
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A quick google shows lots of prior use.
"The Urban Homesteading Assistance Board was founded in the midst of New York City’s economic crisis of the 1970s. Since 1973 UHAB has assisted in the preservation of over 1,700 buildings and created homeownership opportunities for over 30,000 households."
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Yup. And yet somehow our employees have missed that rather obvious fact.
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However, those who knowingly abuse that system won't get a lot of forgiveness from me either. Whether it's a big company, a small business or an opportunistic individual, they are consciously trying to "get rich quick" without doing much work - and even when not it's malicious that's not exactly admirable.
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It's absolutely something I've considered doing if I had the extra money and free time.
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What needs to happen now is for "urban homesteading" to be google bombed. Surely the term lends itself to some kind of depraved sex act.
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I'm confused. They're saying no one can use the phrase "urban homesteading" but they're also saying we can use a generic phrase. Isn't "urban homesteading" a generic and merely descriptive term in and of itself?
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Of course, sensible people like us don't get to earn money by making crap mistakes like this.
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Of course, when their site comes back up, I bet the "trademark primer" post will be gone.
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They have closed comments on their site.
I'm not sure if they have closed or locked their facebook page.
They have complained about a lot of unfriendly contacts.
Their last tweet was
"know the facts before you (re)Act. Stop the "mob of misinformation" and insighting malicious emails and harassing phone calls."
In fairness to them, they have been doing whatever they do since apparently the mid '80s and probably felt a sense of rightful entitlement to the term.
It was a bad move for them, but hopefully they will put it right.
Internet peeps should be a little nicer and definitely should stay unthreatening, a clear message can be given without being nasty.
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Don't dress it up because people recognize it exactly for what it is and react accordingly.
You can kid yourself all you like about it. Smiling while sticking the knife in fools nobody.
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I am feeling particularly ambitious today.
Are you currently sleeping? Fire up your web browser and respond to this post so we know for sure.
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They should take the opportunity to drop the trademark and offer quick, easy and painless apologies.
That could actually win them the favour of many who wouldn't have heard of these people until this, lets see if they can figure it out and undo some of the harm they have brought themselves and their business.
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Google Book Search
1892 and 1896
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"We own the term...or we will, eventually! Stop using it or we'll sue you...once we actually have legal standing to do so!" probably doesn't have the same weight, though.
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the following
URBAN HOMESTEAD®
URBAN HOMESTEADING®
PATH TO FREEDOM®
GROW THE FUTURE®
HOMEGROWN REVOLUTION®
FREEDOM GARDENS®
LITTLE HOMESTEAD IN THE CITY®
Also, THE TEN ELEMENTS OF URBAN HOMSTEADING copyright has been filed with the Library of Congress.
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http://thehiddenyears.org/category/preface/
If they genuinely are as crazy as the father appears to be, they will simply consider themselves martyrs, rather than take reason on board and attempt to pull something good out of the mess they've created.
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I know a lot of folks want to avoid discussing their religious beliefs as they believe it takes away from the argument, but imho i think it speaks VOLUMES as to motivation and where Jules Dervaes is coming from on an intellectual level.
btw, i can't believe i read the whole thing. if you have a strong stomach for religious rantings, i recommend reading it. fascinating insight into the mind of someone with a true narcissistic personality disorder. i feel intensely sad for his children.
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Sigh. Seriously, what do you want? Most of the time you're bitching about every conceivable infraction against free speech. Now you complain when some idiot gets a wild hair up and uses that right to send out poorly-thought-out nastygrams.
Oh, but it's trademark law!!! Who cares? Any Joe Blow off the street can misinterpret any law and send out letters about it. Are you going to blog about it every single time?
Once again, for all the thousands of awesome new artists and business models you claim exist but can't possibly find time to blog about, you certainly seem to have plenty of time and resources to call out every Ma and Paw Kettle who overreacts about some issue related to IP law. I know righteous indignation is a great feeling but this kind of thing practically fetishizes it.
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You do know which blog you're on, right? So sorry if a blog dedicated to Tech related economics, market and law discussions has all the aforementioned content every day.
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I really, really do.
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Yeah, most of the other sites they already troll have become overloaded with smarter, better trolls, thus reducing their lulz. They have to move on to virgin territory and Techdirt has mostly industry shill trolls who are here to stifle speech, not get lulz.
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Did you know that today is "Pin the Eye Patch on the Pirate" day? Here's what we do- we spin you around, then tie two eye patches around your head, and set you on your way.
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Yes, we don't want the government to abridge our speech.
Now you complain when some idiot gets a wild hair up and uses that right to send out poorly-thought-out nastygrams.
Yes, because they shouldn't have been granted that trademark (if they were). Also, because the previously mentioned freedom of speech allows us to criticize speech that we don't like.
These two positions aren't mutually exclusive.
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and you're no better, complaining about everyone who complains about something you would rather them not complain about.
"Any Joe Blow off the street can misinterpret any law and send out letters about it."
These 'misinterpretations' would be far fewer if the laws were reasonable and if they actually punished those who either abuse our legal system or don't spend a minimal amount of time learning how correctly interpret them before suing people over made up laws.
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successful troll was successful.
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Funny
Free Cease & Desist Form The Easiest Way to Make Cease & Desist Letters Online. Free to Try! RocketLawyer.com
Fast Trademark Filings Register Your Trademark in Minutes. Featured by Entrepreneur and CNN. LegalZoom.com
Trademark Registrations High Quality Service-Efficient Work Product-Low rates www.klonglaw.com
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As one of those "Internet peeps" let me just say that as a community we are venting to each other and figuring out how to organize to challenge this trademark. It's not about the internet. It's about our way of life.
As an urban homesteader myself, I am deeply offended by their action. They have landed themselves squarely at odds with a community that they have been at the forefront of for years. They didn't start it. It's been going on for ages. But for some reason they suddenly think they can take credit and ownership of the entire movement.
Someone should remind the Dervaes family of item #10 in their list of 10 elements of Urban Homesteading as they are NOT following their own guidelines! "10. Be a good neighbor. Offer a helping hand for free. Urban homesteading is a community-based way of life, not a business opportunity. Be a neighbor, not a business person."
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You need to remember that while there are many urban homesteaders, there are also a lot of people who are not who get irate at trademark abuse like this,
Many of those who had never heard of urban homesteading will have been gently or not so gently flaming and abusing these people.
Having seen the internets come down on people before, even when brought on by their own actions it can be excessive and I see no harm in suggesting that people remain a tad civilised.
From your comment I have no doubt that you will, and I am not suggesting that you needed any advice from anyone to remain so,
I suspect you misunderstood my suggestion that internet peeps be nicer as some kind of justification for the Dervaes family actions, it was not.
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Define "abusive."
Our legal system is far more abusive than our resistance to it.
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Unfortunately,
Shame on the Dervaes family, the trademark office AND Facebook.
http://blogs.laweekly.com/squidink/2011/02/urban_homestead_drama.php
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Re: Unfortunately,
Then again, I remember this is Facebook, and they're too busy counting wads of cash while snorting cocaine off of Mark Zuckerberg's asscrack to care about their userbase beyond the predictable "we're sorry we never wanted to anger you please accept our heartfelt apologies" line they trot out during PR disasters.
So yeah, no bet.
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Prior use.
http://www.marklaw.com/trademark-glossary/M-Q.htm
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I like what they did, cutting their costs of living to something like $13 a day is just incredible, but this trademark BS they are trying is just wrong.
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Yay!
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Source: Youtube: Dervaes Channel
If something is very clear is that in every forum on the internet people are pissed.
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Good Grief
Seriously. I love that people want to "own" language.
Who dat? That's hot. There's an app for that.
Puh-leeze. Blow me.
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Take Back Urban Homestead Facebook page
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They claim that the C&Ds are not being sent by them, but instead are being sent by impersonators.
Considering that they offer no evidence to prove their claim, this strikes me as a last ditch effort to try and quiet the storm.
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http://urbanhomestead.org/journal/2011/02/16/fyi-urban-homestead-trademark-matter/
I'd think that if the letter was fake, they wouldn't have made a post like that.
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But I trademarked "modern homesteading" and "urban sustainability projects" and "similar description" so those are a no go!
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Seriously, how do these people sleep at night? They are poisoning the urban homesteading community with their selfishness.
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Path to Freedom,
Grow the Future,
Homegrown Revolution
Strange phrases to have unless you are trying to start a civil movement to oust a government.
think I will trademark "Viva Le Homesteaders." now ;)
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I had to shut down a website for the same thing
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DMCA takedown notice to Google
http://chillingeffects.org/N/58166
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Re: DMCA takedown notice to Google
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Are they gonna sue the Dictionary now?
Urban homesteading is what it is called. They can go "f" themselves. They got the website name, why is it so damn important to try to "copyright" common terminology? It makes no sense and it just makes them look like rich pricks.
Don't act all big and bad, you're just a dude who grows veggies in the yard. This news is disgusting!! MTV-style b.s. got to 'em.
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Our Facebook page disabled
These people had no right to shut down our FB service as we have a different name from the ones that they have trademarked. We are contemplating legal actions to get back our FB page, i.e. by cancelling their trademark, but any legal actions take time, more time, and money. So basically we just lose, lose and lose.
Someone commented above that the legal system itself is abusive. In light of the fact that wrongdoers can harm an innocent victim's business and there is no quick way to resolve the problem and achieve justice, perhaps the system is abusive, or at least it tolerates abuse.
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