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Boy Scouts Bully Hacker Scouts Into Submission
b1tbkt writes "Youth-focused Maker organization 'Hacker Scouts' has announced their decision to surrender their name due to bullying by the Boy Scouts of America. It appears that BSA has interpreted their federal charter to include a claim on any and all use of the term 'Scout' in an organization's name. The litmus test for such a claim, so far as I'm aware, is the likelihood of causing confusion. The term 'Scout' is sufficiently generic, though, and by this reasoning most every airline in the world would need to eliminate 'Airlines' from their name."
Letter from Camp
Dear Mom,
Our scout master told us all write to our parents in case you saw the flood on TV and worried. We are OK. Only 1 of our tents and 2 sleeping bags got washed away. Luckily, none of us got drowned because we were all up on the mountain looking for Chad when it happened. Oh yes, please call Chad's mother and tell her he is OK. He can't write because of the cast.
I got to ride in one of the search & rescue jeeps. It was neat. We never would have found him in the dark if it hadn't been for the lightning.
Scoutmaster Webb got mad at Chad for going on a hike alone without telling anyone. Chad said he did tell him, but it was during the fire so he probably didn't hear him. Did you know that if you put gas on a fire, the gas can will blow up? The wet wood still didn't burn, but one of our tents did. Also some of our clothes. John is going to look weird until his hair grows back.
We will be home on Saturday if Scoutmaster Webb gets the car fixed. It wasn't his fault about the wreck. The brakes worked OK when we left. Scoutmaster Webb said with a car that old you have to expect something to break down; that's probably why he can't get insurance on it. We think it's a neat car. He doesn't care if we get it dirty, and if it's hot, sometimes he lets us ride on the tailgate. IT gets pretty hot with 10 people in a car. He let us take turns riding in the trailer until the highway patrolman stopped and talked to us.
Scoutmaster Webb is a neat guy. Don't worry, he is a good driver. In fact, he is teaching Terry how to drive. But he only lets him drive on the mountain roads where there isn't any traffic. All we ever see up there are logging trucks.
This morning all of the guys were diving off the rocks and swimming out in the lake. Scoutmaster Webb wouldn't let me because I can't swim and Chad was afraid he would sink because of his cast, so he let us take the canoe
across the lake. It was great. You can still see some of the trees under the water from the flood. Scoutmaster Webb isn't crabby like some scoutmasters. He didn't even get mad about the life jackets. He has to spend a lot of time working on the car so we are trying not to cause him any trouble.
Guess what? We have all passed our first aid merit badges. When Dave dove in the lake and cut his arm, we got to see how a tourniquet works.
Also Wade and I threw up. Scoutmaster Webb said it probably was just food poisoning from the leftover chicken, he said they got sick that way with the food they ate in prison. I'm so glad he got out and became our scoutmaster.
He said he sure figured out how to get things done better while he was doing time.
I have to go now. We are going into town to mail our letters and buy bullets. Don't worry about anything. We are fine.
Love your son,
Cole
P.S. How long has it been since I had a tetanus shot?
Aha, worked for my pr0n folder too
Could they change their name to Boy Hackers Of America?
No, learn how copyright law works. The BAS is forced to do so by interpretations from the last few decades. Further, it's a deliberate re-use of their brand name; not just "scout" as in the dictionary definition, but in the specific context of non-profit national youth organization.
Wow, bullying, in the boy scouts? I'm utterly shocked. Who would have though an organization full of teenage asshole testosterone pumps would be susceptible to bullying?
Just because the national management is regrettably old-fashioned and very very conservative does not mean the youth themselves are assholes. At that age they more often actually live up to the public Ideals.
Common Sense isn't as Common as people think...
Wow, bullying, in the boy scouts? I'm utterly shocked. Who would have though an organization full of teenage asshole testosterone pumps would be susceptible to bullying?
This was bullying by the boy scouts, an even less shocking phenomenon.
(If anything, the boy scouts, and similar organizations in other countries, have actually chilled out considerably since the bad old days in the fires of psychotic European ultra-nationalism. They still skew right on god and gays; but the 'direct feeder into the armed might of The State' vibe has been toned down considerably)
http://www.scouting.org/sitecore/content/Licensing/Protecting%20the%20Brand/Boy%20Scouts%20of%20America%20Trademark%20Listing.aspx
They have to defend their trademark, or they will lose it. IMHO, "Hacker Scouts" is confusing and when I first heard it I thought it was a Scout-related computer group.
In this particular case I think there is some merit. The goals of the organizations, how they operate, and the "user base" are similar. "Scouts" is nowhere near as generic as "airlines". Obviously the Hacker Scouts is specifically named after the Boy/Girl Scouts.
It's more like me marketing a cereal called "Apple Loops" or something. Generic words but I wouldn't last 2 seconds in court against Kellogg's because I'm targeting the same audience just like Hacker Scouts is targeting the same people as the other "Scouts".
Yes, because no one would use "Scouts" for girls, would they?
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Yes, this was done by a bunch of 13 year olds from troop 26 in Spokane, WA - not the adults that run the national organization. There's no way THOSE guys could be a bag of dicks.
One would think that the BSA could use this to their advantage. Among their demographic, hackers have better public opinion than boy scouts.
Kid: Yeah, I'm here for the scouts. I brought my laptop.
Scoutmaster: Welcome, here's your manual of how to tie knots, a pamphlet on why you should always vote republican, and your assigned times to go to church! Watch out for the troop leader of group 40. Lets just say you'll need your pocket knife for more than carving bears.
Kid: Wait... what?
Techies don't understand legal reasoning or the law.
No one with a brain does.
Da derp dee derp da teedly derpee derpee dum. Rated PG-13.
"I don't think that word means what you think it means".
Since when is protecting your trademarked name bullying? It's simply business. The law forces organizations to do this or they lose their right to their own name. Like the Boy Scouts or not, the problem here is the law.
The Girl Scouts of America were founded as a sister organization to Boy Scouts of America. That is, at one time they were two separate arms of the same organization (at least in a de facto sense if not a de jure one).
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
I can remember a day when Boy Scouts of America would have been approving of something like hackerscouts.org because they would have shared a central theme; curiosity, experimentation, education, science -- all good things to interest young people. It's disappointing to see the BSA stooping to such douchenozzly levels. The have apparently lost enough positive virutue I would not want to be associated with them today.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
The hacking group claims they are creative. They should prove it --- the next creative work should be a creative new name.
Any businessperson knows you must have your own creative and unique names and marks. You cannot ride the coattails of another organization's name without the risk of a lawsuit. A quick search of TESS shows the word "Scout" by itself has multiple trademarks on it. Since this is the name of a youth group and the BSA and GSA have trademarks on "Scout" in youth groups, there is a clear trademark case to be made, and fought about in the courts.
But it gets more complicated than that.
Both the Boy Scouts of America and Girl Scouts of America have a charter from the United States congress. Their charters give them additional power beyond traditional copyright law. Specifically, they include "exclusive right to use emblems, badges, descriptive or designating marks, and words or phrases" for their organizations which extends beyond traditional
So first off, all organizations MUST sue when they discover other people using their marks. It is not an option. Trademark holders are required either to defend the mark in the courts or risk losing the mark. So the BSA really doesn't have much of a choice in the matter. The marks they use are also boosted by the congressional charter, so any fight brought by the "Hacker Scouts" will face both the traditional trademark battle (which is difficult) and a congressional charter (which is also difficult).
The group did something any business lawyer would have warned them about --- avoid using any names that are already trademarked. They chose to pick a word that is already trademarked, and are now facing the inevitable consequences of it.
//TODO: Think of witty sig statement
>teenage asshole testosterone pumps
It sounds like you need a LOT of therapy for whatever dysfunction causes you to lash out at these kids.
Wow, that's quite the bullying there.
Once the BSA found out about the name, they sent some of their older members over to intimidate, physically threaten, and wedgie the heck out of the HS kids until they agreed to the name change.
Wait...no, they didn't.
Ahh, they verbally abused the HS group, calling them a bunch of whiny geeks with no right to the name.
No, they didn't do that either.
Oh....they sent a letter, asking that the HS change their name as they felt it may be confusing with their organization. If they failed to comply, they were willing to allow the courts (you know, that group your tax dollars go to partially in order to settle this kind of dispute?) decide on the matter.
Yep, that's quite the "bullying" there.
I've gotta start keeping score on Slashdot. 1 point for every misleading, sensationalist, or simply factually incorrect headline I see. At 10 points a month my reward is to quit reading this stupid site.
While it's fun to ridicule the boy scouts, from the Hacker Scouts own web site:
Hacker Scouts is an inclusive, diverse, co-ed organization designed to support the next generation of makers, explorers, entrepreneurs, and leaders through an innovative program that blends creativity and technical skill through the study of science, technology, engineering, art, and math (STEAM). Every part of our organization is guided by the fundamental belief that children learn best when they are self-motivated and enthusiastic about a subject, when they have skilled mentors, and when the environment supports their social, emotional, and cognitive developmental needs. In Hacker Scouts, kids have the opportunity to explore new concepts and skills, focus on their individual goals, and create community. This makes us unlike any other program. In a quickly changing world, Hacker Scouts provides a relevant, consistent, well-rounded foundation of knowledge combined with an emphasis on values like resourcefulness, ingenuity, creativity, and persistance that will support our kid's ability to adapt to new technology, now and in the future.
and
While most of our activities are targeted at the 8-14 year old range, all ages are welcome at Hacker Scouts Open Lab. Because Open Lab is not a drop off program, parents and mentors are available to help modify projects for younger makers.
It would appear that they target the same age groups as the boy scouts (including cub scouts) and even hold scout sunday events like the boy scouts. It's not too far of a reach to see why the boy scouts might say there could be confusion between the two. After all, in terms of official scouting, there are Cub Scouts (including TIger Scout, Wolf Scout, Bear Scout Webelos Scout), Boy Scouts, Explorer Scouts, Adventure Scouts and probably others. Who is to say somebody wouldn't think that Hacker Scout wasn't part of that group?
Just saying, that in this case, the boy scout organization, might have a valid point.
Techies understand it in a way a little different from lawyers. They tend to see it as they would a computer program: Clear, unambiguous, and occasionally exploitable if you can find something the law allows even if the writers obviously didn't intend to.
In the real world, judges tend to frown upon people exploiting technicalities like that and rule against them regardless.
One of my favorite legal 'exploits' is OFFSystem - a p2p file sharing network which functions only by transmitting random data. As no copyrighted information is ever stored or transmitted, the creators think it should be legally safe. Somehow I cannot imagine a judge agreeing, but it's too obscure to have been sued yet.
Nasty overhead, though. It works by creating blocks of random data, then creating a new block by XORing that with the copyrighted file. Both blocks are thus random, of maximum entropy in themselves. The copyrighted data doesn't reappear until the two blocks are XORed together again, something that can only be done by the recipient who knows which blocks pair together.
The BSA is the official boy's youth program for the Mormon church (as selected by the Mormons, not the BSA).
"All apples are red, therefore anything that is red must be an apple." That's how you are defending the claim that the BSA is a Mormon organization. No, not even "all apples", "some apples", since only some Mormons are member of BSA.
"Some racists buy Fords, therefore Ford is a company run by racists." There's the car analogy.
...then you effectively are proving everyone knows what the term Scout is used for in reference to youth organizations. They could as easily been the Hacker Pioneers, the Hacker Navigators or the Hacker Pathfinders.
I know this will be unpopular, but this is probably one of the less bad infringement cases I have heard of.
No, I'm pretty sure it was a scout camp. At least some kind of scouts, and now that all falls under the BSA.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Maybe having those charters should subject them to being subject to certain civil rights laws as a public organization rather than allowed to be discriminatory like a private group has the perogative to be.
I know I'm replying to a troll, but the BSA has done tons to curb abuse and bullying. Youth Protection Training is the only instructional course leaders are required to complete prior to contact with any boys. It's freely available for anyone to take at myscouting.org, and must be renewed every 24 months. There have been coverups in the past, but the modern scouts have gone above and beyond to "think of the children."
Almost all Boy Scout Troops are hosted by churches. The Boy Scouts embrace religion as the foundation for building a good citizen.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
So first off, all organizations MUST sue when they discover other people using their marks. It is not an option. Trademark holders are required either to defend the mark in the courts or risk losing the mark.
100% wrong. If they do not defend it they can luse it, but you don't have to sue to defend it. You could issue a $0 license, and that would be a successful "defense" so far as trademark law is concerned.
But suing is not a requirement, it is a last resort. Or the first resort of scoundrels.
Learn to love Alaska
second only to that of JROTC.
As part of my JROTC I got to shoot an M-60. The Boy Scouts had me camping in the parking lot of a church.
Learn to love Alaska
"Some members of BSA are Mormon" doesn't mean "BSA is a Mormon organization" any more than the fact that some Mormons drive Fords makes Ford a branch of the Mormon Church.
If you read through the HS site you will see that they did not just borrow the name. The organizational structure, rewards, ranks, and patch system are all borrowed heavily from BSA. So while it is convenient to label BS the bully here, HS does not pass the smell test of non-infringement. Not by a long shot. As a long time scouter, and maker, I fully appreciate what HS is trying to do. But creating a scene and yelling "but, we did it for the children" does not make it any more legit. You would need to be as ignorant as the poster to not see through the ruse. The act of "crying wolf" to twist the social media scene to falsely swing sentiment in your direction is getting old. I was happy to see the majority of posters see through the smoke screen and call it what it is.
I think you're completely disregarding that the BSA is a Mormon organization. Keep your unsexist, non-racist, scientific minded, freethinking kids far far away...
Right, because enlightened people don't want to be around narrow-minded bigots who stereotype others and advocate excluding them from activities they participate in because of a lack of decent values like... hmm... waitaminute.
... unless you're all for all the oaths and honors and other mindless appeals to duty and unquestionably of authority, second only to that of JROTC.
Yeah, no. Scouting tends to focus a lot more on both self-reliance and on helping others, in my experiences as a kid. I also find it kind of sad that you consider the words "honor" and "duty" to be contemptible things to teach to kids. The world would be a much better place if there more people felt a duty to their fellow man than to just themselves.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
I was a closet atheist scout in the '80s. The church/scout links were so tight, there was no non-church troop anywhere near me. And joining one at a catholic church made me an automatic member of that church. They didn't even have a don't ask don't tell policy, like they developed later. They just had an "assume Christian" policy.
Learn to love Alaska
I don't know where you get this Christian crap. I was active in the BSA from 1975 until 1995 as both a youth and an adult. While it has always been clear that they support the belief that religion was important for good citizenship, I never saw any indications of an implication toward specifically Christian. The Synagogue that sponsor scout troops would also be rather surprised about this. I know that the books on religion included a number of non-Christian religious medals.
I was in Beavers for 3 years. I was in Cubs for 3 years, and I was a leader of Beavers in addition to being a Cub, and I was a Scout for 2 years and a leader of Cubs during that time.
I'm the eldest son from a navy family, and my father was gone more often than not. It's hard to learn to be a man when you don't have a role model, and the scouting movement gave me one. Not because I fell into it by accident, but because he took steps to mitigate the loss his absence brought. I'm very glad that he did. My experience has a great similarity to that of young men I see from broken homes being raised by single mothers, and when I look on them, I can see the negative consequences that he protected me from, and I'm grateful.
Boys and young men need masculine culture. It's important. The Scouting movement do the best they can to meet the need in a positive way, and they do a pretty good job. If you're not offering something better, you have no right to piss on them.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
Even ignoring sexual orientation both organizations are openly sexist. Neither allows someone of the
opposite sex to join. Why shouldn't a girl who likes to camp be allowed to join Boy Scouts or a boy
be allowed to join Girl Scouts. The both should drop gender from their names and create programs
and policies that allow boys and girls with similiar interests to both join.
For pointing me to an organization my kids would rather be in.