Facebook Sues Teachbook Over Trademark Concerns; Where's Legalbook?

from the generic-plus-book dept

OG was the first of a whole bunch of you to send in the story of social networking giant Facebook suing the tiny Teachbook site, which apparently only has two employees and hasn't even launched yet. The concern, of course, is with the whole "book" ending. Even though Facebook took its name from the very commonly used "facebook" name given to the collections of photos handed out to incoming students at many colleges, it now feels that its name has become more closely connected with social networking. And it's afraid that anyone else using "book" as a suffix for a social networking site could lead to its own name being considered generic.

"The 'book' component of the Facebook mark has no descriptive meaning and is arbitrary and highly distinctive in the context of online communities and networking Web sites," the complaint explains. "If others could freely use 'generic plus BOOK' marks for online networking services targeted to that particular generic category of individuals, the suffix 'book' could become a generic term for 'online community/networking services' or 'social networking services.' That would dilute the distinctiveness of the Facebook marks, impairing their ability to function as unique and distinctive identifiers of Facebook's goods and services."

This isn't quite to the level (as some people are claiming) of Facebook claiming to own the word "book," but it does seem like a stretch. It's one of the many problems seen with the gradual broadening of trademark law to include such concepts as "dilution," rather than sticking to the basic "likelihood of confusion," standard. Whining about companies copying the suffix of your name seems pretty excessive. The tech world is littered with examples of certain prefixes and suffixes suddenly becoming popular among a number of companies after one becomes successful -- and it's never been a real problem for the original brand. Think of how many companies ended in "-ster" after "Napster," and how many companies copied Flickr in ending with an "r" and a dropped vowel.

Filed Under: book, social networks, trademark
Companies: facebook, teachbook

Significant Objects Becomes A Book... More Infinite Goods Creating New Scarcities

from the cool dept

Last year, we wrote about a fascinating "art" project, called "Significant Objects," that involved a bunch of writers buying up random cheap/worthless trinkets, but then listing them on eBay along with a creative (fictional) story about the object. The "story" was given away for free, but the object cost money. What those involved in the project quickly found was that these worthless trinkets were suddenly selling for a lot more than their nominal "price." It was a perfect example of how an infinite good (the story), when properly attached to a scarce good (the trinket), can make that scarce good much more valuable. This is a point that many have trouble grasping. They think, when we discuss the economics of infinite and scarce goods, that the price on scarce goods always remains the same, and never seem to take into account how a connected infinite good can greatly raise the value and the price of a scarce good. A hit song (infinite) heard by millions increases the price of a concert tickets (scarce). A brilliant blog post (infinite) can increase the price of a consultant (scarce) who wrote it. A sterling reputation (infinite) for an automobile company can increase the price of the cars (scarce) they sell. It goes on and on and on.

The Significant Objects experiment was just a neat "pure" example of this in action, clearly showing how objects that otherwise would have been valued quite low by most potential buyers, could gain in value when an infinite element (a good story) was attached.

It's cool to see that those behind the Significant Objects projects are still trying to do more with the concept. The auctions apparently are still going on, but now they're trying something different as well. They're taking those stories and compiling them into a book (scarce). In fact, the story behind the book (infinite) makes the physical book more valuable as well. To make it even more "valuable," they've brought on some top artists to illustrate the stories -- so even if you read them for free online, there's now more value in buying the physical book to have the physical artwork as well.

Filed Under: book, business models, economics, infinite goods, significant objects, stories

Win A Copy Of Kevin Smith's New Book

from the connecting-through-contests dept

We recently wrote about how Kevin Smith was connecting with fans in a variety of ways, and after doing so, some of "his people" (see? I got this movie business lingo down) contacted us to see if we wanted to give away some copies of his new book, Shootin' the Sh*t with Kevin Smith: The Best of SMODCAST. So, we said sure, because we're told by people all the time that Techdirt readers "just want stuff for free." These aren't signed books or anything -- we tried, and apparently we're not cool enough and the signed ones are a reason to buy, so if you want that, pay up, cheapskate. But, hey, these books are still free. What are you complaining about?

Anyway... I've put together some trivia questions, which shouldn't be that hard to answer if you listen to Smodcast regularly (or if you're a creative Googler). Alternatively, write up a comment about something having to do with Kevin Smith or his movies, and make it funny, cool or original (preferably all three). Anyway, we've got five books. There are three trivia questions. The first person to answer any one of the trivia questions correctly gets a book (if you know the answer to more than one question, don't be that guy -- we know you're awesome; just let someone else get it). Then we'll take the two best Kevin Smith stories and award the books to them. If, by Monday night, no one's been able to figure out the answers to trivia questions (and, who knows, maybe I'll give hints), then for every unanswered trivia question, we'll pick another "Kevin Smith story" writer. Oh yeah, make sure you include a working email in the email box so we can contact you and work out the details. If we can't reach you or you don't respond to our emails in time, the free book goes on to the next winner... That's about the deal. This is intended to be fun, so don't go nuts over it. Silent Bob wouldn't approve.

Trivia questions (remember, just answer one):

1. When Clerks was first shown at Cannes, what famous rocker did Scott Mosier have to go wake up on that rocker's yacht one morning?
2. Kevin's got some dogs (three, I believe). One has a habit of interrupting SModcast with barks, and recently traveled to NY to bark on a special east coast SMod. Name the dog...
3. Smith recently got to meet the father of one of his heroes, who he's suggested there should be a new religion around. Who did he meet?

Again, if you're the first to get any of those right, you get a book. If you get more than one right, you still get just one book, but whoever is quick and copies your second answer in the next comment gets the next book. If you don't know any of these... start listening to SModcasts, or write a cool story that involves Kevin or (more likely) his movies. Update: Wow, you guys are fast. All three trivia questions answered. But, now we're still open for stories: talk about Kevin or how he influenced your life in some way and a book could be yours...

Filed Under: book, connecting with fans, fans, kevin smith, movies, scott mosier, smodcast

Reason To Buy? The $1 Million Wine Book

from the might-be-a-very-limited-audience dept

As book publishers are starting to struggle with the same business model issues facing the music industry and others, it seems at least one publisher has come up with a unique "reason to buy" -- though, it may be slightly out of your price range. johnjac points us to the news about the $1 million wine book. It is, as described, a book about wines that will run you a cool $1 million. Why? Well, because it comes with the wine it talks about. The book will list out the world's top 100 wineries, and with the book you'll get a six bottle case from each winery listed in the book. So, the book, plus 600 bottles of wine from the 100 best wineries in the world. They're only making 100 copies of the book... and 25 have already been pre-ordered, so hurry up and order.

Filed Under: book, reason to buy, rtb, wine

Streisand To Publish An Entire Book Detailing The Malibu Home She Once Wanted To Keep Very, Very Secret

from the the-streisand-effect-book dept

Well, this is amusing. As you may know, a few years back, I coined the phrase "The Streisand Effect" to describe the situation where someone tries to force some content to be taken down, in an attempt to suppress it -- but, in doing so, winds up driving much more attention to the content. The name came from a lawsuit filed in 2003 by Barbara Streisand against environmentalist/photographer Ken Adelman, who had been photographing the entire California coast from a helicopter in order to document coastal erosion. Of course, in trying to have her photo taken off of his site, it generated significantly more interest in that particular photograph. Streisand eventually lost the lawsuit and was even ordered to pay nearly $200,000 in legal fees.

Of course, since then, the phrase "The Streisand Effect" has become fairly popular and in common usage -- and has been featured in Forbes, Associated Press articles and on NPR's All Things Considered -- and has even been translated into other languages. All because Streisand didn't want a distant photo of her Malibu home on the internet.

Thus, it's with some level of irony that we find out (thanks Stephen!) that Streisand is now putting together a book about the architecture of that very home including numerous photos of the home and property. Perhaps Ken Adelman should sue for helping her to realize that there was "demand" for photos of her Malibu home.

Filed Under: architecture, barbara streisand, book, home, streisand effect

From Infinite To Scarce: xkcd Goes The Book Route

from the the-way-things-work-these-days dept

A bunch of folks have been sending in the NY Times story about how the online comic xkcd is going to be putting out a book, and that it's being done avoiding the traditional book publishing process. There are some key quotes in there, including:

In fact, the xkcd story previews the much more likely future of books in which they are prized as artifacts, not as mechanisms for delivering written material to readers. This is print book as vinyl record -- admired for its look and feel, its cover art, and relative permanence -- but not so much for convenience.

And then there's the more important point about Randall Munroe not worrying about copying of the content -- and instead focusing on the other direction:

Publishing a book is an extension of the selling of items like T-shirts and posters, which pays the bills, he said, to a "free culture" mind-set about the cartoons themselves. "We have been encouraging people to share things, saying that it is a good business decision," he said....

One trick in transferring the material from online to print has been how to recreate the "title text" that comments on the strip when your cursor hovers over it.

"It's not supposed to be a punch line, but hopefully if you didn't laugh, you'll laugh at this," he said. The title text will appear where the tiny copyright notice would appear on a traditional strip.

Does that mean that the book won't carry a traditional copyright and instead take its lead from the online comic strip itself, which Mr. Munroe licenses under Creative Commons, allowing noncommercial re-use as long as credit is given?

"To anyone who wants to photocopy, bind, and give a copy of the book to their loved one -- more power to them," he said. "He/She will likely be disappointed that you're so cheap, though."

It's been clear from pretty much the beginning that Munroe understands that getting more widely known is a lot more important than worrying about "piracy," and it's great to see him take that attitude even further.

Filed Under: book, infinite, randall munroe, scarcity, xkcd

Ronald Goldman's Father Sues Pirate Bay Over OJ Simpson Book. Will He Sue Google Too?

from the your-bizarre-story-for-friday dept

It's really not all that surprising that when people first discover The Pirate Bay they think that it's responsible for the unauthorized content that people can find through it. However, at some point you would think they would take the time to understand what's really going on and how it's more of a search engine than anything else. Unfortunately, too many people seem to jump right to the "sue them!" stage. That's apparently what's happened with Fred Goldman, the father of Ronald Goldman, the guy who was killed along with O.J. Simpson's ex-wife years ago. Goldman won a civil lawsuit against Simpson, for which Simpson owes him millions of dollars. Since Simpson isn't paying, the court has been turning over various assets to Goldman, including the royalties from the bizarre "If I Did It," book that Simpson wrote. It's that book that's the problem. Apparently (and not surprisingly, for a best seller), someone scanned in the book and put up a torrent of it which can be found via The Pirate Bay. Goldman, of course, is blaming the site rather than whoever actually made it available and suing the Pirate Bay, claiming he's "lost" at least $150,000. That, of course, incorrectly assumes that the people who downloaded the book would have bought it in the first place (most of them wouldn't have) and that none of the people who downloaded it later bought the book to read it in the more convenient book form. No matter. It's more fun to just sue. Goldman tries to bolster his argument by pointing out that The Pirate Bay has big name advertisers on the site, but that doesn't change the fact that it's not the one who offered up the infringing content. Besides, if that's Goldman's criteria, why doesn't Goldman sue Google as well? After all, a simple search on Google shows that you can find the book there as well -- and there are advertisements right next to it as well.

Filed Under: book, oj simpson, ronald goldman
Companies: pirate bay