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$30K Worth of Multimeters Must Be Destroyed Because They're Yellow
An anonymous reader points out a post at the blog of Sparkfun, a hobbyist electronics retailer. They recently received a letter from U.S. Customs saying a shipment of 2,000 multimeters was being barred from entry into the country. The reason? Trademark law. A company named Fluke holds a trademark on multimeters that have a 'contrasting yellow border.' Sparkfun's multimeters are a yellowish orange, but it was enough for Customs to stop the shipment. Returning the shipment is not an option because of import taxes in China, so the multimeters must now be destroyed. At $15 per item, it'll cost Sparkfun $30,000, plus the $150/hr fee for destroying them. Sparkfun had no idea about the trademark, and doesn't mind changing the color, but they say restrictions like these are a flaw in the trademark system. "Small business does not have the resources to stay abreast of all trademarks for all the products they don't carry. If you’re going to put the onus on the little guy to avoid infringing IP then you shouldn't need an army of consultants or attorneys to find this information."
Did Fluke actually request this? Or did Customs do this of their own volition?
If it's the latter, Fluke should step up and allow them to make a one time exception for this shipment. It would generate considerably goodwill for the company and show that they're not bullies keeping the little guy down.
If they DID request this, then fuck them all with a chainsaw, seriously.
This is a typical example of the consequences of 'intellectual property' extremism that harms society for no good reason.
Sounds like Bullshit to me.
it should all be turned away at our ports
I dream of starting a company that can innovate with new products. But I suspect the reality would be a nightmare of lawyers and hassles instead.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
The Department of Homeland Security is nothing but a bunch of thugs. Having dealt with them before on customs, this is basically some government employee flexing their muscles because they like the power and have nothing better to do. The appropriate amount of boot-licking and obsequiousness (and tribute payment) is required in order to get it through.
Those look a LOT like a Fluke multimeter, in more ways then just the color. I find it hard to believe that isn't intentional.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
sounds like an isolated incident.
This is why we can't have nice things.
For blue, red, green, purple, white, black, tan, clear, brown, striped, poka dotted, etc. multimeters, and de-facto own all the rights to create all multimeters?
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I'm not even going to comment about the main point of the story, because I can't get past what is ever more troubling to me - how is it if you make something in China, and have it shipped to you that refusing the shipment involves import taxes in any way?
The devices would have had to have been labeled as originating in China so there's no way there should be import taxes on the devices simply returning in the same shipment.
To me it sounds more like the manufacturer just didn't want to deal with the issue and made up that excuse. If I were the company I would press them much harder to take back the devices, so that they could just change out the body panel colors.
I wonder also if there would by any way to ask to go and modify the devices manually to get them to a state where entry was accepted - just going in with tape or paint could correct the issue.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Remove the meters from their plastic case and sell them at a discount.
So you have to hire them to know what they are.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
And let the customs office do your research for you? Probably less than the army of consultants or attorneys.
I've trademarked black writing on a white background. Please destroy any materials that infringe on my IP
Ok, you can't send em back, and the gov't says they aren't legal here. Why not a third destination?
Those people who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do. (Isaac Asimov)
Pretty sure I had a Dark Grey faced with yellow border cheap multimeter before 2000. But I don't suppose checking for prior art is too high on USPTO's checklist before granting trademarks like this. Trademark is all well and good, but this seems a little broad. Next thing you know someone is going to trademark red cars with black wheels.
Which one should I get instead? Preferrably one that has already passed customs...
http://memegenerator.net/instance/47413433
John Fluke must be rolling in his grave. Then again, its been a long time since differential voltmeters were in common use. I've never seen one with a yellow painted cabinet.
Schools are struggling to find the funds to replace textbooks, let alone put their hands on some good hardware like this, and we can't find some way to donate this hardware instead of destroying it? Who cares if the legal document states that no one over the age of 18 is allowed to posses it, at least let someone get some use out of it.
Talk about stupid.
If he had tried to make the multimeter in the "rounded rectangle" shape, with a form factor that will fit in one's palm, with a readable display facing the user, Apple would have sued zim for $30000 per infringement.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
If I google "yellow multimeter", there are a ton of non-Fluke meters that show up.
The meter I have in my lab looks just like a Fluke, but I bought it at Fry's in my poor college days.
It's too bad SparkFun's product got snagged, they are a favorite local supplier for the Denver/Boulder electronics industry. I drive to their will-call all the time when I need cables, dev boards, and such.
Anyway, how did all the other yellow meters get through customs??
Trademark law is to protect you and me, its not there to protect businesses. In places like China, trademark is not enforced like it is in the USA, and fake goods are common and that hurts the consumer. For example, fake condoms are common in China which are not adequately quality controlled which can greatly affect one's life.
This is unfortunate that sparkfun is having this problem, but all in all I prefer high standards in trademark laws and I think any rational person can see that the pros vastly outweigh the cons.
Maybe if they made them in the US or at least somewhere than a bottom-dollar (bottom-yaun) factory in China, this wouldn't have been an issue.
Almost any country in the world (Japan, Germany, UK, US, Australia, Singapore) can make good products. China gets the business because they can make stuff cheap.
Ironic the "fair trade" laws... the DMMs can't be sent back to China because of Chinese import duties. Imagine the political ramifications if the US had the same import laws as China did... including the demand for a domestic partner with 51% control of all ventures.
Sure everyone likes to blame the big guys.. but seriously a little market research goes a long way.
1. look at current competitors in the field.
2. notice how all of their multimeter have a particular look that matches their company logo.
3. pause and think... hmm maybe I shouldn't make my product look like theirs....
4. ???
5. profit.
Yellow Fluke multimeters have been around for a long, long time. I find it very hard to believe they "didn't know Fluke had a trademark"
If they haven't talked to an intellectual property lawyer yet, they should do so immediately. Safety yellow on an electrical testing device is incredibly generic.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
because they were trusting? http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=unrepentant&sm=3 plus the book of death & debt zionic nazi genociders had already patentdead 'owning' everything. we unchosen settlers never saw us coming
Sorry, I like SparkFun and all but this does look a lot like Fluke industrial design. Ok so the colour isn't EXACTLY the same shade of yellow, but if you removed the branding from it and asked somebody what brand it looks like they'll say Fluke assuming they've poked around the market any or are in the industry. Granted it would be cool of Fluke saying something like "OK This ONE time" since SparkFun is all about hobbyists who might eventually become Fluke customers. SparkFun should have thought of this before ordering a container full of them, pleading ignorance that your multimeter is DAMN CLOSE to somebody else's product and not expect trouble is dubious at best. It looks a lot like a Fluke 17b with out the buttons.
Destroyed? Hello No...
These will be on Woot in a few weeks, re branded of course.
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
I notice that SparkFun Electronics is a registered trademark. I'm sure they'd have no problem with my competing companies, SporkFun electronics and Sp@rkFun Electronics.
In the law, ignorance is not an excuse and hasn't been for centuries if not millennia. You are responsible for what you sell and, yes, for better or worse, colors have been trademarkable for a while now. I know of several examples like T-Mobile's magenta and Reese's orange, and I'm not even a retailer.
I have no doubt that SparkFun would exercise its trademark against infringers, so I have little sympathy for their case even if their violation was unintentional.
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
Is Sparkfun claiming that the striking similarity to another companies long established product line is just a Fluke?
Plain and simple. It was designed to look like a fluke.
If your small business can't keep track of enough stuff to keep from infringing IP, then buy from suppliers who will indemnify you for IP infringement. Or just buy from reputable retailers.
You decided to get some sketchy Chinese meters from a company skirting the law to try to save some money or raise margins. And now it bit you. It seems like this is how the system is supposed to work.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Any "hobbyist electronics retailer" attempting to sell a multimeter in the US knows -- or should know -- what a Fluke multimeter looks like, and any businessman or businesswoman knows -- or should know -- that there will be problems trying to sell a product that looks like the product with a dominant share of the market.
Also, you don't need "an army of consultants or attorneys to find this information." Trademarks are freely available from the USPTO web site, in searchable form. Anybody can look them up.
Finally, most business contracts between a manufacturer and a distributor will have an indemnification clause, in which the manufacturer warrants that the product has no intellectual property issues and, should a claim be made against the distributor, the costs associated with such claims will be borne by the manufacturer. If Sparkfun's contract for the Fluke knock-offs didn't have such a clause, I'm sure their standard contract will in the future.
from madison ave. for us
I've owned multimeters but never heard the Fluke name before today. It sounds like their main feature is the color of the case rather than the gizmos inside. I think I'll go out of my way never to buy their products.
They're clearly trying to copy Fluke. No question. This is what trademark law is for. Even the narrowing at the bottom looks like Fluke. Screw Spark.
I am holding in my hand at this very moment a grey faced yellow bodies multimeter which was made in china and sold at walmart. I guess laws only apply to the little guys.
-73, de n1ywb
www.n1ywb.com
It would be a hell of a lot easier to empathize with SparkFun, if they weren't being such whiny little bitches about the whole affair (which, FTR, is their own damn fault - Fluke's been around and using that same design scheme for decades).
Look - you didn't do your due diligence, and got yourself burned for it; suck it up, learn from your mistake, and move on with your lives.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
This is indeed odd. From the actual document of the trademark owned by Fluke it specifically states: Color is not claimed as a feature of the mark. Either there is some other reason the items are being refused entry or Fluke is falsely claiming a trademark infraction, at least if it is because a similar color yellow was used.
Besides, isn't it up to the courts to determine trademark violations, not customs?
There is no room in scientific endevor for intellectual cowardice. If those multimeters are indeed 'yellow' they fully deserve their ignomious fate! It's no fluke that their cowardice has lead to their ultimate destruction...
"Fluke" brand wasn't used or anything similar.
Anyone should be able to sell a product in a red and white can.
Maybe Sparkfun can ask Fluke for an event-based waiver in an open-letter. This gives Fluke the option to show themselves as a "good guy" in a very public way and not waste good tools or resources of a decent company.
It is an moment of humility to ask a question.
It is a lifetime of shame not to ask.
they should re-export them to Mexico
But most Americans born here grew up with more honest set of retailers, more honest wholesalers, reasonably effective enforcement, they have not had this cheap imitation knock off problem. The worst you would see is the Walmart brand (Equate?) of nasal spray next to one made by J&J. If you had never gone home and opened a package of Cynthol bar soap and find inside a foul smelling skin abrading cake of caustic alkali with Sinthol stamped on it, you have not been affected by these knock-offs. So all the power to customs agents to spot the cheap knock-offs and take suo moto action to knock the imitations off the planet.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Well, it's not like this is something new. Companies have been able to trademark colors for some time. And it's not like Fluke is some unknown company -- they've been around for a long time and everyone in the industry knows their multimeters are yellow around the edges. I'm skeptical that Sparkfun is completely innocent in all this. A quick look at their website shows that their company colors feature red, which appears to even apply to their circuit boards and tools. One would think their multimeters would be red, not yellow.
And as for forcing them to be destroyed, well that's how customs has always worked. Thirty years ago I had some alcohol brought back from Europe that I failed to declare. The choice was to pay the tax or have it destroyed and pay for the destruction. Either way you're gonna pay.
Having said all of that, there seem to be lots of other things like this that do make it through customs, and one gets the impression that Sparkfun would have had no problem if their bribe had been big enough.
Proverbs 21:19
Well, it's not a case over the case. It's just the back and outside of the case is yellow.
This is what Fluke switched to in about 2000 and what this is emulating.
The case is supposed to look like a black case in a yellow case because that's what older Flukes did, they had a black plastic case in a yellow rubber case.
But that just made meters more bulky and made it harder to access the battery compartments. So Fluke dropped that a long time ago and the clones did too.
Also, the destruction is mandatory in this case, it's part of the punishment for the transgression.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Paint them.
Grab a toothbrush, get some red and blue paint. and SPECKLE the damn things. scrape what hits the display with a razor. or would that cost more than the 30k loss?
I'm siding with the import police on this one. I looked at the images and they look a LOT like a fluke DMM.
The overall design is like their meters from a few years ago.
Even the silk screening is the same style.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
It's not just the color around the edge. The text 'Digital Multimeter' is the same FONT used by Fluke. The shape is nearly identical. Sorry SparkFun, as has been said many times before, ignorance of the law is not an excuse.
(1) The number of people on /. attacking Sparkfun over the whole affair is sickening. Clearly, for too many of you, if you've seen it done for a long time - if it's standard practice - it must be alright. Were the likes of you always in charge, I can't imagine slavery, segregation, sexual discrimination would have ever ended on an official level. Trademarking a color scheme is absurd. In a rational society that would be the end of it.
(2) Any chance they can export the meters to Canada, repaint, rebox and ship back? Perhaps there is some small business... I can't imagine the end result would be profitable with the initial expenses and the new shipping and repainting expenses, but it has to be better? Or not. This is just stupid.
Call the EPA. Tell them it will be bad for the environment. Let the government agencies spend their resources fighting it out instead of trampling on our rights.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
http://www.usitc.gov/publicati...
"* Certain Digital Multimeters, and Products with Multimeter Functionality
Investigation No. 337-TA-588
(Publication No. 4210; December 2010)"
from http://www.usitc.gov/intellect...
(Warning 162 page pdf)
Basically Fluke was a party behind the Trade investigation as to importations of comparable-appearing knockoffs.
I have no horse in this race; I don't use multimeters and couldn't care less who wins (although I tend to be a free-marketeer, generally). Imagegoogling for both, some of them look remarkably similar. I'd say the block was justified. If a bunch got through before the ban was enforced, that doesn't mean the ban was unjust or arbitrary.
-Styopa
Instead of destroying them or sending them back to China, Sparkfun should have seen if they could send them to another country where Fluke doesn't hold the trademark. Forget China, try the Philippines or someplace in South America.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Seriously, this trademark is too vague. If you want a specific shade, put Putnam Brown (UPS) it's silly but ok. But to say yellow and some other color effectively names only an unspecific yellow.
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
Why in the world should we allow such trademark laws to exist. I am sort of an off white pinkish color. Should I trademark my skin color. Will US Customs burn all people who usurp my skin color?
The thing that I don't understand is why returning them would impose a large import tax, when it was simply going back to country of origin and manufacture. How does that make any sense? And would that import tax on a mere 2000 devices really have exceeded the cost of destroying them?
Returning them is also more sound because at least then you can re-skin them and sell them eventually.
To me if you are going to manufacture anything it only makes sense that you would ensure the ability to return the products in case of an issue. What if they had simply delivered devices that didn't work? It seems like the same import tax dilemma would have applied.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
when you remove branding?
http://killer.xxx/the_car_anal...
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
I mean I was told nanotechnology assemblers were going to be the future, but now it looks like nanotechnology just means a really fine powder. 3D printing is the future now, I believe it!
when the USCG interdicted my boatload of hookers and blow.
https://www.google.com/search?q=yellow+multimeter&tbm=isch&sa=X&biw=1269&bih=685
Did GE also copy Fluke? One of their meters is on the first page.
/Any/ attorney fresh from law school who has taken /one/ course in trademark law would know that there are circumstances where colors can be trademarked. No "army" needed here.
If Sparkfun has an issue with anyone, it would be with the manufacturer of those devices - not the countries that enforce IP laws.
Now I really want to see a Caterpillar branded multimeter. Are they in the business?
Can't they just spray paint over the 'offending' yellow strip, and sell them at a slightly reduced price? I doubt anybody who actually uses a multimeter would be worried about the paint being perfect.
Like Band-Aids or Xerox, the Fluke brand-name is used as a synonym for multimeters and lab-multimeters.
So, I can only imagine how such a widely used term could cause Fluke's legal department to be very aggressive in protecting their trade-mark...
maybe its the weed up here
Ideal https://www.google.ca/search?q...
Fluke https://www.google.ca/search?q...
ideal clamp meter https://www.google.ca/search?q...
fluke clmap meter https://www.google.ca/search?q...
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
That's like saying some company like General Motors owns the Bow Tie badge and no one realized it. There can be no instrument company in the world that is not familiar with Fluke products and their color scheme, and if they design products using that scheme then it's pretty clear they are hoping to use the scheme to entice buyers because it's associated with high end equipment. It doesn't matter if Fluke or customs blocked it. It was still a stupid thing to try.
Once they've been caught. Fluke being one of the major names in meters they absolutely knew what they were doing in choosing that color. They were hoping the color recognition would help sell units. It was part of this companies marketing strategy. Make a meter that people will think 'its like a Fluke' when they look at it. Which is exactly why it's trademarked. Now I will agree trademarks in general are silly, but for these guys to plead naive is also.
I've used Fluke equipment for a very long time, before that Beckman products as well and unfortunately like anything in this arena (meters, test equipment etc.) as soon as they release a product nowadays it gets copied. A lot of the Fluke designs have literally been hijacked to the point that unless you closely look for the Fluke branding, you can't tell the difference until you get into a calibration test and I've seen the cheap imports fall flat in areas where it matters. For the average guy out there tinkering it doesn't matter but in high end manufacturing and testing, it does. It's akin to fake Rolex Watches, designer handbags and the like with feature/functions that have been carefully worked out including tolerances that can mean a product or test passes or fails. Because we're talking about multimeters here, It really is no different an argument than Cellphones manufactured by two different companies where one has patents or trademarks on their designs. These are the mechanisms allowed by law that allow these companies protect their IP but regrettably there are importers that will try and sneak their product in, taking the risk that Customs will confiscate the items. I realize Sparkfun just want to sell to enthusiasts out there but really, they should have checked before trying to importing them.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
Maybe so, but I think the argument made in the original article is still valid. If you're going to copyright your color scheme, you better list a *specific* color shade. Simply declaring "yellow" or any other primary color to be "your copyrighted color" is far too broad a statement.
People who pay a premium price for a Fluke meter are usually well aware of what they're paying for. Just because a Chinese knock-off comes out with similar colors doesn't mean people would be fooled into thinking it was equivalent to a Fluke.
I have one of these cheap meters and it works great for a tiny fraction of the price of a fluke. fluke the meter Nazis
I think they were planning to SELL them for $5/unit, so lets say they cost $2.50 each to make (probably less).
So then the total value of 2000 units for customs would have been $5k. How can you possibly have import taxes for return that come anywhere near the $30k they say they are losing? I don't see how the import taxes would possibly be anything greater than 100% of the declared value of the shipment, so it should make more sense to return and pay the import taxes, than write off the entire cost of manufacture + pay the cost of destroying them.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
http://www.lowes.com/Search=di...
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
http://appleinsider.com/articl...
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Trademark, not copyright. Though often lumped together along with patents under the heading of 'intellectual property' they are actually unrelated areas of law with little in common.
I have several $300 multimeters and dozens of $3(harbor freight)-$10(Canadiantire/other storename) multimeters, and for the VAST majority of uses the $3 ones work just fine. If I need to clamp current read XX Amps DC, I gotta grab a more expensive one; But testing batteries/AC Adapters or household current the cheapo's do just as well and while they may not technically be as accurate even the cheap ones can often be adjusted and manually calibrated to be close enough by all reason....
This is just a case of patents/trandmarks keeping value in dominate market holder(fluke). I wouldn't be at all surprised if fluke used some of the same hardware used in $10 multimeters.
Utterly useless.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Seriously, companies like this are their own worst enemies. Had these been sold, the Chinese manufacturer will simply create their own slightly modified copy of it and sell it for a fraction of the price. Now, this company is on the hook for screw-ups.
Have to hand it to China. They get to block just about everybody via tariffs, manipulate their money relative to others, subsidize and dump on western markets, while the west just ignores this.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
If you search on digital multimeter on either amazon or sears, you quickly see that multimeters with a black face with a yellow edge are not exclusively fluke, amazon had five other brands that used that color scheme in the first few pages of results.
This is like stanley saying that they have a trade mark on tape measuers in a chrome case.
Fuck Fluke. You don't own yellow (and the case color is more tangerine then yellow to begin with). Nor do you own that particular rectangular layout of multimeter functions.
Many in the world are no longer allowing themselves to be held hostage to the myth of absolute IP. Where what are common and easily understood as human shared resources - color, shape, sound, biology - get perceived as wholly and forever owned by single entities purely through the machinations of lawyers.
The confusion comes from thinking that everything must be viewed as a 'market'.
Why not create 2,000 new blue and green cases? Ship those cases in and then simply replace the cases on all the units rather than destroying them.
Not just the yellow, but the entire design is a bit close for comfort to this Fluke model, it's probably not just the yellow but the combination of shape and control placement with a yellow outline and grey front.
Did you read the trademark in question or just the deceptive /. summary?
Or how about using Google and looking up pictures of the two multimeters?
Oh, I can see you did none of the above.
There's a reason that many things in industry are Yellow. The MM in question clearly say "Sparkfun" on them, not "Flike", "Fluk", "Flake", "Flook" or anything else obviously trying to mislead consumers. I own a Fluke, a really expensive one. It's awesome. I'm not confused in the slightest.
Bullshit trademark.
Fashion designers can't trademark colors. They must have _ distinct mark. They can't patent clothing unless they can show it has _ brand new functional difference, such as shoes that work as can openers. To grant _ trademark so broad as "yellow around any other color it contrasts with" could _________ all other players if the only source of the right insulating material were yellow. So the trademark is unjustly broad, and should be invalidated. That's like giving _ trademark on any word that begins & ends with the same vowel.
Send them to NZ, we don't have the same patent nonsense here and good multimeters sell well.
If you go to the USPTO trademark search and put in "multimeter and yellow" the FIRST result is a Fluke yellow multimeter.
If you are in the business of making multimeters and claim you have never heard of Fluke or seen one you are clearly full of it.
Company caught clearly knocking off other company's product tries to play the "trademark laws is bad, boo hoo" card.
Not impressed
-jon
Have you noticed all the T shirts and other gear with NFL logos on them? Those are made and sold by other companies with the permission of the NFL.
What a trademark holder is not allowed to do is sit silently, allowing infringement, implying that it's okay while other people build businesses around the mark, then suddenly sue five years later. If you want to allow someone to use your mark in a certain way, you have to explicitly grant permission for a specific use for a specific period of time. That way no-one is confused as to what you're allowing.
The American Guild Of Trademark Attorneys says otherwise.
Just kidding, of course, but this is just another case of laws being written that exist, primarily, to benefit lawyers. Oh sure, on the face of it, the laws may appear to be there to protect the consumer or the inventor but that's just what you're expected to think. The average citizen's needs are never taken into account. If you want to avoid violating a law, trademark, patent, etc. then pay up buster!
Just as pink is a trademark, registered to Owens-Corning Fiberglass, yellow is registered to Eastman Kodak.
Mess with Kodak at your own risk.
It is likely Sparkfun or some other Western importer supplied a Fluke DMM as a sample and said "we want something like this". Now, China being China, they do tend to focus on the cosmetics. They are excellent copiers. In this case, too good. Sparkfun might be telling the truth about their ignorance of the trademark, but certainly not of the original article.
then you know Fluke has trademarked those colors.
It is on par with a car company selling a new car called a 'Mustang' and then saying they didn't know there was a 'Mustang', and it's unfair becasue they can't know every trademark law.
Is this the smartest way to handle it? no. If Fluke wanted to look like some awesome hero's, they would make a move to allow them into the country under the agreement that Sparkfun changes the color schemes once in the US.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I can't see how Fluke received a trademark for such a color scheme. In the world of electrical equipment, bright yellow and orange items are found everywhere. Take electric power extension cords, for example. They are yellow or orange to make them stand out among the rest of the tools that are scattered about any work site. The same is true for a variety of instruments and gauges.
everyone in the world knows that fluke meters are yellow
whaddya mean officer, going sixty in an ice storm is illegal ? it wasn't mentioned in the drivers manual....
as to the total bull*** cost, havn't these people ever heard of spray paint ?
Actual intentional Fluke clones stream across the ocean in small lots from ebay every day. Some of these are presumably actual Fluke meters, just being sold by the factory directly, rather than through normal channels.
Plus the hilarious things like FUKE meters, which are very clearly inferior copies, but intentionally made to look similar.
And then the generic $3 meters in red, black, yellow, orange, green, whatever. Sometimes these come with a brand name you've never heard of, sometimes they are completely devoid of all identifying marks.
I'm guessing that way more than 2,000 of these have made it in the country so far this year, mostly with laughably and obviously bogus customs forms.
From reading the comments, it would appear that Fluke really did "invent" the yellow multimeter, and they have a legitimate concern about protecting their trade dress. But for most people (particularly those under 40 or 50), "cheap multimeter" (of any color) is a stronger brand than "yellow multimeter".
See that "Preview" button?
This is not a troll or a plug for where a company builds a product, just an observation that US Customs would never have known and never interfered if the products were manufactured here. The company then would have had more control over their property in event of such a claim and probably had the opportunity to change the color instead of paying the government for the service of destroying their product. A friend once stated some advice "Never invite THE MAN into your life", don't break the law because that is also an invitation for 'THE MAN' but avoid inviting him otherwise.
fluke multimeters are about a 100 bucks
Cheap ones that are readily available on ebay (you don't need sparkfun) are under 30
so, the real reason is that fluke is desperate to stop the loss of market share; each multimeter spark notes sells for 15 bucks is a potential 100 dollar sale that fluke lost
Agreed, this is an attempt to copy Fluke's recent multimeter design.
It's not just yellow. It has the same color scheme, same display layout, similar fonts, same case taper as a real Fluke. Brand name in same location as is the model number and description. It was designed to look as much like a Fluke as possible.
If I saw the sparkfun multimeter sitting on a bench in my lab, I would think it was a Fluke until I got close.
Sparkfun knew this when they bought them. Their fault. If they did not know it was designed to imitate a Fluke, they are in the wrong business. "Other companies did it and did not get caught" does not make it right. They risked it anyway and lost. Complaining about the trademark is not the solution.
How can an entity own curved sides and any shade of yellow. This is out of hand people. Had they did this and then printed the word Fluke on it OK. This is no different than Apples rounded corners. Companies can now own geometric shapes, colors, and even DNA. These are things of nature, not men. What is this world coming to?
Ignorance of the law is no excuse, but in 18 years of public and private education, I was not every told about any laws, except in passing, unless you want to count reading the constitution in the 12th grade.
It used to be that governments had secret laws that you could be guilty of without even knowing it was illegal. We've done something better. Most laws are public but there are so many of them no on can possibly know them all -- ask any lawyer.
Competition Good, Monopoly Bad.
Reading the title I was expecting to hear that a single fluke meter had been destroyed instead.
I used to work at Fluke, and one of the project managers tried to get permission to sell one of the tools in multiple colors because color choice would've been popular in certain markets.
He was shot down because the product wouldn't have been Fluke's trademark yellow.
If you would actually read the trademark, it mentions dark gray and yellow in a specific, illustrated pattern. This knock off clearly copies it (whether on purpose or accident is immaterial).
Seriously. How hard does this have to be?
Are you saying you've never heard of Fluke? C'mon, son.
starting with the lawyers. Problem solved.
So yeah, this Sparkfun meter looks an awful lot like a Fluke, but a reasonable observer can distinguish it from a true Fluke meter by visual inspection. The prominent "Sparkfun" badging on the faceplate certainly helps in that regard. If it said "F1uke" or "Fruke" or "Fluke" in a slightly different font, that would be a different story. Now, the eleventeen other wholesale customers the Chinese factory is banging these out for? Probably not so much. But this particular shipment looks clean. Also, a quick check of their website suggests Sparkfun has been selling this exact meter, in the exact offending color scheme, for some time, in which case Fluke was already doing an atrocious job of defending their trademark.
As for the source trademark, yeah... "Yellow" and "Grey" is pretty broad. If anyone is going to trademark a color, they should be specific, like Pantone Matching System specific. As has been mentioned previously, Tiffany's has experience in this area.
Why destroy them? Why not ship them back and have the cases changed/painted? This is gross.
Twinstiq, game news
I've got a yellow wavetek that I've had for quite a while. Same color yellow as the Fluke.
I don't understand why they can't sell, or donate, them to another party in another country, just put them on ebay as a lot auction.
Because that is the same kind of logic they use with regards to pirated movies and music. Every pirated copy represents a lost sale of the higher priced "legit" product. 1:1 ratio, as if every person who downloads a movie on torrent would have bought a BluRay at full price if the torrent wasn't available. Great for the studios when calculating their claimed "losses" from piracy, but pure BS nonetheless.
In the real world of electronics hobbyists, far more people will buy a $30 multimeter than would ever buy a Fluke at $100 and up. But for a kid farting around with an Arduino or an RC model or whatever, the $30 POS might be all the meter he or she needs, at least until they move on to more serious work. Hobbyists have NEVER been the Fluke target market, and likely never will be.
Certainly, the Fluke is the better meter, and if you work on line powered gear, you may be taking a BIG risk by trusting your safety to Chinese knockoffs like this Sparkfun POS. The reason that even the low-end Fluke meters cost so much more than the generic One Hung Low meters is that Fluke actually designs their meters to meet minimum safety standards, so they don't explode in your face while testing line voltage. Proper fuses, input protection networks, rugged switches, good quality input jacks and test leads, etc. all cost money, which is reflected in the product cost.
I have a Fluke multimeter that's over 20 years old. Still works.
It is black.
But it comes with a yellow bumper case that no one every removes because it has the probe holders and the stand.
I don't get it, removing the pcb from a multimeter is childs play, why don't they just destroy the plastics, and order a different color plastic from the manufacturer? Sure, it'll still be expensive, but less so than ordering complete new multimeters.
Is destruction really necessary when there is paint?
2. Declare as parody materials
3. Import
4. ???
5. !!!
6. Profit!
IMHO this is insane. Copyrighting color, form or shape - this is totally insane. And this event and also Apple vs Samsung event shows it.
One should not be able to copyright form or color. One can already copyright name and logo - this is enough. If company wants people to recognize their products - the can put their name/logo in a prominent place and then sue everybody who puts same name/logo without licence. But saying that only them can make yellow multimeters and rectangular phones - this is simply insane.
I bullshit you not, my yellow multimeter just broke. It's reading in everything at like 6x its real voltage now. DAMN IT!
I read the paper, I checked in the Fluke site.
90% of all hand multimeter's looks like the sketch in that damned trademark. Almost half of the multimeters I see on stores around here (Brazil) looks like a Fluke. Almost half of the multimeters I saw on sale when I was a teenager (hell way before 2000) looks like a Fluke device.
It's just the best design for the job.
Thank you, Fluke. Now I have one more reason to avoid north-american products (that use to be pretty good, but not so good it can't be replaced).,=
Lisias@Earth.SolarSystem.OrionArm.MilkyWay.Local.Virgo.Universe.org
"Sparkfun had no idea about the trademark"
Total, unmitigated, 100% bullshit. Everyone knows that fluke meters are yellow. They thought they would just be cute and sell a cheap Chinese knockoff that "looks" like a fluke.
Except that SparkFun is not a fly-by-night eBay seller. They're a relatively well known, established retailer of electronic goods.
Also, Take a walk through any retailer that sells multimeters, and you'll find them with yellow contrasting cases/borders. I have two, neither are Fluke. And both are name brand, not knock-off.
Problem solved.
the flaw here is that trademarks can be applied to colors and shit. trademarks should only apply to logos. anything more is just insane for anybody to keep up with - small business or government.
You know how it says "SparkFun had no idea about the trademark?" IAAL working in trademark law. We have companies come to us ALL THE TIME to say, "we are thinking about launching a new product/brand. Are we in the clear?" We typically charge a maximum of $200 for a comprehensive search memorandum including a recommendation whether to continue, or to make product/brand changes. SparkFun was cutting corners, and now are a cautionary tale. You can be quite sure that if a DIY electronics company launched calling itself FunSpark, nobody would be like, "oh, they didn't know about SparkFun? No problem."
Not your lawyer. Anonymous internet comments are not a source of legal advice.
Think of the ecological damage by destroying them on top of wasting resources. Someone call Fluke and see if there is a way to buy out the cost of the infringement just so a butt load of ewaste is not generated.
IANAL, but if you click the link to the trademark filing the filing specifically says that color is NOT claimed as part of the mark. I thought I would buy a FLUKE one day, but this changed my mind.
It's bs and should be completely destroyed and left that way. At least you can order things over ebay and avoid a lot of this interference.
If they got them made in the US by US citizens who spend their earnings back into the US economy then US Customs would never have got involved and some Americans would get a job making the product... but on the other hand the manufacturing costs, including the mandatory health insurance, would likely be higher.
I said this when I was studying Electronics Engineering (later I studied CS, have paper in both, but I digress): "If they make it and its good, then its a Fluke!"
F capitalism.
I've got a "no buy" list. At the very top is Sony. Nestlé is also way up there. Now it has got one more entry.
Bullcrap. I have a Fluke meter. It wasn't cheap. This thing looks EXACTLY like it.
Bullshit. Give us an image of this Fluke meter that looks exactly like the SparkFun meter, or we may as well assume that by "exactly" you mean "it's gray and it has yellow on the sides and there's a dial in the middle and it has a display on the top and the wires connect at the bottom" which is a description that's so generic that, if you toss out the part about the yellow, it's difficult to find a multimeter that doesn't match the description.
So far, the only images I've seen anyone post are on the order of an "any white laptop is obviously a MacBook" degree of similarity. ...and as long as I'm posting, I'll mention that there's also a trademark on scissors with orange handles. Not scissors of any particular design, and not orange plus some other color, just any scissors at all that happen to have orange handles. Honestly, shit's so retarded these days that I wouldn't be surprised to learn that Apple now has a trademark on the color white when it is applied to any electronic device at all.
That's racist! Just because they're yellow and come from Asia...
That would be like worrying about all the positive integers being taken.
You seriously overestimate people's ability to distinguish colors. Think of how many colors your average person can distinguish by name. Especially consider that, to the average person, there is no "cyan" because in most people's minds it isn't sufficiently different from "blue" to warrant a whole new word to describe it, so they call one "light blue" and the other "dark blue."
Hell, a friend of mine has a hat which, when indoors, is clearly red, but when outdoors, is clearly orange. So what do we do when we're to the point that all colors, including red and orange, are trademarked, and so someone attempts to create a red-orange multimeter but the customs agents view the thing in different lighting than the people who mixed the pigments viewed them in?
Also, it's worth noting that there's a similar trademark on scissors with orange handles, except that it's even more generic in that it covers any scissors with orange handles, rather than the slightly more specific Fluke trademark that requires gray with a yellow border. If someone bothers to trademark the other ten or so colors available, then the only generic colors left will be some sort of vomit rainbow mix in order that the scissors obviously aren't any particular color. ...at least until someone trademarks that as well.
It's too bad that trademarks aren't limited to things like brand names or symbols. ...you know, the sorts of things people think of when they think about trademark laws. I think it's rather safe to say that SparkFun never would have purchased a multimeter with the brand name "Flúke" or "Fluké" or anything else that was obviously intended to be counterfeit. Trademark law was created so that consumers could know who manufactured what they purchase so that rogue manufacturers couldn't take advantage of a better manufacturer's reputation, but lately it's being used to get a monopoly on popular designs. In other words, if you can't beat your competition on price, and your customers only care about what things look like, then just make it illegal for your competition to give customers products that look like what the customers want the items they purchase to look like. That's what the whole Apple vs. Samsung thing was about. No one thought Samsung's products were Apple's products. They just wanted something that looked about like what the two products both looked like and Samsung was offering that look at a lower price.
I'm sure Dave Jones would be happy to take receipt of them, have them painted, and returned to the US. For a nominal fee of course.
I see many of you bashing on SparkFun. Have any of you actually used cheap multimeters? Most all of them are YELLOW! Its true some are not but I think you have to be a complete idiot to think these things look like a Fluke and not look like one of the hundreds of cheap brand DMM.
Just sent then to other country... sell then there or paint then to other color.
Higuita
They apparently patented it.
Could I just suggest that there be a website where I could post a photo of an object I hoped to sell, and if no-one commented within a reasonable time then I could point at that post as a valid defense if some git wanted to do this to my tiny little business. I would suggest 2.7 minutes, but I don't like this sort of stuff. But it would be fun to argue in court that the other guy's attorneys had a "duty of care" to be monitoring this site 24x7 (at the other guys expense, I might add). Of course, the current standard duty of care is imposed in the other direction even though the supporting search process is way stoopid. Let's start to use real-time for what it's really worth.
Of course, this plan would never work because the rent-seekers among us have more money, and thereby more access to the legal system, than the rest of us. That is, the rest of us put together.
Cory Doctorow ( Pirate Cinema ), you are my new god of IP stupidity. Must read for all of us, never mind the nit-pickers among us.
"There is no god but allah" - well, they got it half right.
Sparkfun got caught with its hand in the cookie jar. Look, they're no longer 2 guys working out of their basement, it's a rather decent-sized operation that's capitalizing on the "Maker" wave. Good for them. But that doesn't let them play dirty pool. I'm not saying they commissioned the counterfeit design, I'd bet almost anything that some sweatshop in Shinzen has been stamping these things out for years.
It's clear that SparkFun over-reached on this one, the resemblance to Fluke meters goes way, way beyond the color. Others here have provided links and comparisons, they'll all correct.
One of my oldest & most durable meters, an HP 971A, is essentially the same yellow color, but no one is going to mistake it for a fluke: http://www.mytestsignal.com/wp...
Fluke isn't concerned about a legitimate competitor, they're worried about the typical cheap "10 cents on the dollar" Chinese knock offs that confuse consumers and de-value the Fluke brand.
Agreed.
A little company doesn't know about the design of a product made by one of the largest manufacturers of multimeters in the world? And the fact that that company's basic design, and colour scheme, has not changed very little for years makes me think "cheap ripoff".
Noter to SparkFun: ship them to Singapore - there's no duties to pay. Then find ACBTU (any country but the USA) to sell them to.
Fluke is a manufacturer of higher quality testing equipment, and has put in a lot of effort on brand recognition. It is not by accident that these units match. Now it may be that Sparkfun simply purchased a bunch of cheap Chinese units who had copied the trademarked systems, but it's not Fluke who is at fault here nor should be villanized.
So how much to have 2000 made in the usa ? I dont think it would be that much after all the circuit board could be assembled by robots and just final Assembly needs humans hands I guess they could have boards and cases shiped to mexico and import them from mexico
I have two Chinese made non-fluke multimeters from different manufacturers and they are both yellow.
The functionality of the sparkfun meter (from looking at the dial and the sockets) looks like a subset of the Harbor Freight meter that is so cheap they usually give them away. I would expect that they cost Harbor Freight south of a buck each. If Sparkfun are paying $15 to an OEM to make these for them, they're in the wrong business as they'll never make a profit.
I suspect $15 is the retail price, not the cost to them. They probably are $2K-$3K out of pocket.
I own a Fluke meter and would never trust my life testing 480 3ph circuit with some cheeply made piece of crap DMM from China.
If China wants to clone Ray Ban sun glasses and sell them on a beach in Cabo, fine, but only a fool will trust their life to test equipment such as this garbage.
Sparkfun is realizing that the whole of "intellectual property" has ceased to be about creating an incentive to innovation, and is now nothing more than an entry barrier to competition.
So the USPTO awards Fluke a trademark color scheme without defining the actual colors? How does that work? If Sparkfun's next batch of red DMM's is not "red enough" for Fluke's liking, can they claim that their red is actually just a very reddish yellow? How about green - that contains yellow too; technically, the only color not covered by this trademark is primary blue.
You may have a very good case with off-road mining equipment. Such a ridiculous claim can be thrown out or invalidated on the basis of examples I would hope. Look at the very slight difference in colors between Komatsu, Caterpillar, Dresser and some older Euclid equipment. Very subtle shades of yellow. It can also be brought back to light that the fundamental reason for the yellow is often for field equipment and tooling to stand out and not get lost or accidentally damaged or destroyed against a varied background.
you can get all the multimeter you need for $5 at harbor freight. and sometimes free with coupon
That is all.
It is actually very possible that they were aware such are imported. Shipments of any kind are "tagged" with an HS-code which will put a certain product in a certain group. Now there is software that can keep real-time track of those shipments between countries or leaving port or entering port. This by itself will only say (I'm not familiar with multi-meters) that something small electronic will come to Port X. I wouldn't be surprised that Fluke keeps an eye on these HS codes, even while still talk about millions of USD's of merchandise coming in, when you see a specific HS code come in, you can request further details. All these details are available.
I must agree with the premis that the difficultly to get certain information is keeping the little guy down. It is not just trade mark law, try getting a simple low voltage, non-invasive device through FDA pre-market approvial to allow further research studies to be done. And then try and get the racketters at UL to test it for less than $10K. Hell they want $500 just to give you any guidelines about how to properly design such a device for safety. Not to mention the UL60601 spec keeps changing (on rev4 as of today).
Having a trademark on color is fascist. Sign of the times? It is like having a patent on your DNA, but they are trying, Monsanto will own everyones DNA by 2050, and will be held blaimless thanks to our crooks in goverment and the courts.
Is there any wonder why Engineers are retiring, screw making stuff for the big fasist corperatios. And while we are talking about it, screw MicroSoft and B. G. too.
Fluke made a very generous offer to help SparkFun out, even though they didn't have to. This is FLuke's response to SparkFun: https://www.facebook.com/notes... I have been using Fluke products for years and used Beckman Industrial test equipment before that. In all the years I have used Fluke products I have never had more reliable test equipment. They didn't cause the seizure of those meters for SparkFun. The US Customs and Border protection did supporting a legitimate trademark filed years before. I'm not going to debate the details of the trademark. I've seen too much nit-picking over the last few days from people who aren't in a position to have to defend their brand/product from knock-offs. I think Fluke's response was very generous and in light of all the negativity directed at them for no good reason I would say that was a very nice gesture. It reinforces my respect for the company as a maker of high-quality test equipment and a supporter of the maker community and the industry that uses their products.
"That's racist!"
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
Customs has been stepping up enforcement of trademark infringement because Chinese firms have been building inferior products that almost exactly match the American products. In many cases, the products look exactly identical. The counterfeit Chinese products cost American consumers and business millions of dollars every year. I looked at the multimeter in question and from a distance it looks like A Fluke Multimeter. Sparkfun knew exactly what they were doing with this product and they got caught. It was meant to appear like a Fluke. This multimeter is probably sold under many names by many companies around the world. Sparkfun can't claim this resembled a Fluke meter. Of course they tried to put a spin on it, but they took a chance and they got burned.
I don't work for Fluke, but I was almost killed as a result of a counterfeit Chinese product. In the investigation afterwards, two experts said it was one of the most impressive counterfeits they had seen and by external appearance and tactile inspection almost impossible to tell it was counterfeit. Once opened it didn't come close to the specifications and performance tolerances. The unit came from a reputable supplier who spent a fortune tracing down every unit they sold to pull the counterfeits. Chinese firms are going to great lengths to sneak these items into our supply chain. While this wasn't a case of counterfeit products, I do applaud the US Customs service for stopping this kind of trade.
It start trademarking fucking collors!
Fluke makes very good quality test equipment, I seriously doubt someone is going to think a fifteen dollar meters are Fluke brand, Please! Instead of destroying them, and putting them in some landfill somewhere, they could donate them to schools or other organizations.
US Customs must have some business agreement with Fluke, since there are probably thousands trademark infringement items coming from China and other countries everyday...those get through...
Must be $$$
Many imported, hand held multimeters are yellow. I've had one for close to 30 years that looks like the Fluke 87-v except it's all yellow. the entire case being yellow. Many brands of hand held meters were yellow quite some time ago.The meter in question does indeed look like the Fluke. However, Fluke is apparently doing the right thing. Below is Fluke's response to the situation. http://hackaday.com/2014/03/20...
Could the "yellow" be a reference to racial slurs, as in "Yellow Menace"?