That's what trademarks are for, to protect Mom and Dad from being ripped off.
Exactly (and I have a "Padagonia" vest in Nepal that i got for $5 which is great, but I knew it was a knock-off, of course).
You don't seriously think that anybody will konfuse Killustrator with Adobe Illustrator, do you? Really?
really? Yes. What's to indicate that they are different? they are both vector graphics programs that run on PCs, and let you do pretty much the same things. How is someone without experience or computer savvy supposed to guess at the difference?
all this time I thought the ENTIRE POINT of trademarks was to keep a copy-cat company from selling a product that *falsly claimed* to be from the original product's manufacturer
well, sorry, but all this time you were wrong. the purpose of trademarks is to prevent consumer confusion.
The standard used is "would the average consumer" be reasonably confused by the mark. Not your standard of "anyone, anywhere". Most legal standards are "reasonable person" standards...
Instead of complaining to Slashdot every time your blatant name ripoff is called out (GAIM, KIllustrator), why not just name your program something that isn't clearly derivative of a commercial program with the same purpose?
This is, after all, the ENTIRE POINT of trademarks -- so that the customer knows what they are getting. For someone who isn't already familiar with the applications, KIllustrator and Illustrator could very well be the same thing.
We criticize MS every time they over-use the word "innovation", why not practice some innovation of your own and actually spend ten seconds thinking of a new name.
Yes, you might be able to claim "illustrator" is a generic term, but seeing as how the program has been around for 15 years and is the market leader, I think a court would give Adobe the benefit of the doubt in deference to the consumer identification of the name with their product. They're hardly trying to stop the use of the word everywhere -- only where it is blatantly obvious that its an intended ripoff of their product identification in vector graphics application software market.
Hey, I'm not agreeing with their tactics, just pointing out that (despite seeming contradiction by their pollution) they might be successful for their immediate goal (which was to keep the trees from being cut, and perhaps to discourage companies from wasting time and money trying again)...
but the wackjobs who were out there burned up a bunch of logging equipment, effectively releasing all sorts of toxins into the air and spilling diesel and motor oil all over the ground.
So it sounds liek they were successful.
As nasty as the brief pollution may have been, the trees stood a better chance of surviving than if the logging equipment had remained intact, now wouldn't they?
Well, we're getting tired of the "have-nots" dictating to the rest of us what is and isn't fair, and using a government that we finance as an mechanism for preventing us from living the lives we choose
History would dictate that self-preservation alone should motivate the upper classes to temper the conspicuousness of their consumption (and the obnoxiousness of their contempt).
There's a lot more poor people than rich people, and the poor people have little to lose.
When the poor people are convinced that the rich are depriving them of living the lives THEY choose, there's usually big trouble...
The fall in Microsoft's share price after Judge Jackson's ruling was quite obviously a result of that ruling. A 'fine' wouldn't have been any different, and most Microsoft shareholders would still have placed more of the blame on Jackson (for ruling to fine the company) than on the Microsoft board
No, that's completely wrong and ignores human behavior.
Number one -- a fall in stock price is not the same as a fine because you don't have to sell the stock, you can simply ignore it and wait for the stock to go back up.
Number two -- if someone recieves a notice that their fine of $50 (while possibly much lower than a drop in stock price) is due to the court by XX date, or they personally face contempt of court charges, then it becomes a personal issue.
They actually care about it and see that their own individual well-being is tied to the company on the downside as well as the upside. you can no longer simply take your money and run, you have to actually face responsibility for the company you own.
if Bill Gates or Rupert Murdoch faced 55% of the jail term for corporate criminal violations of the law, perhaps they would police their companies better for violations of law. if they faced 55% of the financial liabilty for the companies in civil case, they might be more concerned about following the law.
As it stands, the worst that can happen is that the company gets a stern *tsk, tsk* from a court, maybe even broken up, but other than stock value, the investors never face any real personal ramifications despite their very real personal ability to influence those violations of law...
This is essentially what happens when the value of a company's stock falls due to a pending judgement
But ther's no direct correlation for the stockholders to say, "hey, you shouldn't have done this because I was held responsible for your bad decisions". The issue is responsibility, not money...
Corporations are artificial citizens. Who would you levy a criminal judgement upon? The CEO? The whole board? All of the stockholders?
Why not? After all, these are the beneficiaries of the illegal conduct. The "corporation" doesn't get anything out of it, only the people making money.
When every stock investor starts getting notices from the court that they need to send in a check for $50 as punishment, maybe we'll finally have worked out an incentive for companies to stop violating the law. No longer will the board be able to say, "well, we have to maximize profits at all costs", they might have to consider how angry stockholders would get to be held personally responsible for their illegal actions.
since the trademark was not in force when the second product came out,
The trademark WAS in force -- it was publically marked with a (TM), which is adequate notice for a trademark.
The filing of paperwork to get the (R) doesn't have to precede the use of the mark. in fact, when you file the paperwork for a trademark registration, the first thing they want to know is "has this mark been used in interstate trade? Please provide copies of such examples."
Actually they are saying that they can't use the term "instant messaging" also.. they trademarked that as well
And its still just as arguable. I'm not saying to roll over for any trademark -- Instant Messaging could be reasonably argued to simply be a description of what the product does.
But to incorporate the "A" of AIM, when it clearly stands for AOL Instant Messnger, is just asking to be sued for infringement, and there's no hope of winning THAT argument in front of a judge.
As a professional artist who is plenty familiar with computers, I confess that I have seen darn few computer works that I would consider much more than graphic design or technical exercises, so your professors and critics aren't coming out of left field.
Wholly computer-generated works that rise to the level of fine art could probably be counted on a few fingers (though I can't think of any of the top of my head).
Works of fine art with computers which are NOT wholly computer-generated, however, are more abundant. Montage and collage have entered a whole new era thanks to the flexibility in computers that the physical materials don't have.
"The art critics... the same response from art professors... and from other schools"
This quote could have come from practically any time before a new art movement took place. So be heartened that you may be the lucky one to prove them all fools and secure your spot in history -- not many have the opportunity to do so, and since computers aren't disappearing anytime soon, I would consider it inevitable that SOMEONE will indeed take advantage of the tools to create new works that we consider fine art.
The bad news is that this isn't a medium, its a tool much more general than that. So first you'll have to figure out *something* more specific than just "computer-generated" to begin a meaningful search.
It would be as if flat surfaces were invented for the first time, you would still have the option of all your mediums, all your surfaces, all your techniques. You couldn't call cave-painting "THE way of making art on a flat surface" any more than you could say duck canvas cloth is defined by oil painting (or vice-versa).
Computers don't impose any limitation analogous to those you see in "normal" fine arts -- not in technique, or method, or time or space or even which sense(s) you appeal to. So there's a heck of a lot of decisions you'll have to make to even start experimenting.
And there's a heck of a lot of learning and experiencing we'll have to do to get to the point where people can recognize that what is being created isn't merely a program or a mathematical equation, but has the requisite creativity and emotive content to be admitted to the club of "fine art".
It took several decades for the fine art world to accept the notion of using acrylic paints instead of oil -- you might be overly optimistic to anticipate them embracing an entirely new way of doing EVERYTHING in the short few years that it has even been possible.
And we'll long have to fight the notion that somehow the computer is doing the real "creating".
So yes, you're right, but you better have some damn good work to back it up if you want to change the world and convince everyone else of it:P
Nathaniel
(Why do I have a terrible suspicion that this story will inspire links to the most horrid examples of amateurish CGI and filter-abused GIMP work imaginable?)
With all due respect to your attorney who believes that ""gaim" and others are not confusingly similar to "aim", he's completely wrong.
You are in the same market as AOL, with a similar product to what AOL produces. They are the market leader, and you took their product name and added a single letter to it. I simply cannot imagine a more straightforward example of why trademarks exist.
Consumer confusion is practically guaranteed between "gaim" and "aim" if they both do the same thing.
And yes, even if they registered the trademark later, they were using the mark in interstate trade (and denoting it as a trademark) from the beginning, so the date of the registration is at MOST an inconvenience for AOL's attorneys -- they still own the mark.
It would be one thing if you called it "GIM", because "Instant Messenger" could at least be argued to be a generic term. But to call it anything with "AIM" was just begging for AOL to come knocking...
The statements imply a significant amount of risk based on running Seti@Home.
No, it doesn't. It implies that the amount of risk is too great compared to the possible benefit.
Even though the risk is trivial, and possibly close to zero, the "benefit" to the TVA for running the software is most certainly zero, seeing as how the only purpose the sotware serves is to suck up system resources.
I hate to be overly critical, but why the hell aren't these idiots moving?
They're not married, dont' have kids in school or a house or anything else to tie them down. There is no sane reason any one of these morons should be staying in a homeless shelter taking up space and food that a truly needy person could use.
News flash: its an expensive city, and there are about a million other people with your exact qualifications looking for the same jobs in that city. All the companies in that city are not hiring for those jobs because they are the ones who laid you off in the first place!
I know that folks in NYC and Silicon Valley can be myopic about the world, but to stick around in a homeless shelter when plenty of other cities and states are still desperate for tech workers is sheer lunacy.
This is like guys who actually get upset because they cant pick up a girl at a strip club. No kidding, did it occur to you that a thousand guys a day ask that girl for her number? Why don't you TRY SOMEWHERE ELSE where the odds are a little better?
Any business doing business in a country is bound by the laws of that country.
All of Yahoo (.fr or not) is bound by French laws for business they do in France. They are not bound by French law for business they do outside of France. If they don't want to obey French law, they can just stop selling things to people in France, or from people in France, and wash their hands of it.
Look at it this way: there are many places in Japan to purchase what in the US would be considered child pornography. So companies that sell that stuff in Japan don't sell it in the US, even if they sell other products in the US. They are bound by US law for business they do in the US, but have every right to cintinue selling that stuff in Japan.
France has NO business telling an american company what it can do for a business practice
They're not. They're telling a French subsidiary of an American company, as well as the company itself, that to do business in France they must comply with the business laws of France. They don't have to obey French laws if they don't do business in France.
This is first semester international business and the more Yahoo complains the more Americans look like arrogant idiots.
Slashdot Mirror
That's what trademarks are for, to protect Mom and Dad from being ripped off.
Exactly (and I have a "Padagonia" vest in Nepal that i got for $5 which is great, but I knew it was a knock-off, of course).
You don't seriously think that anybody will konfuse Killustrator with Adobe Illustrator, do you? Really?
really? Yes. What's to indicate that they are different? they are both vector graphics programs that run on PCs, and let you do pretty much the same things. How is someone without experience or computer savvy supposed to guess at the difference?
---------------------------------------------
Actualy, when GAIM came out, America Online had not yet copyrigted the name "AIM"
you're right, they had only trademarked it.
Not with government paperwork, but that little "tm" is all you need to notify the public.
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AIM is an ackronymn, and everyone knows that you cannot trademark them...
you'd better notify all the intellectual property attorneys of this startling development...
---------------------------------------------
all this time I thought the ENTIRE POINT of trademarks was to keep a copy-cat company from selling a product that *falsly claimed* to be from the original product's manufacturer
well, sorry, but all this time you were wrong. the purpose of trademarks is to prevent consumer confusion.
The standard used is "would the average consumer" be reasonably confused by the mark. Not your standard of "anyone, anywhere". Most legal standards are "reasonable person" standards...
---------------------------------------------
Instead of complaining to Slashdot every time your blatant name ripoff is called out (GAIM, KIllustrator), why not just name your program something that isn't clearly derivative of a commercial program with the same purpose?
This is, after all, the ENTIRE POINT of trademarks -- so that the customer knows what they are getting. For someone who isn't already familiar with the applications, KIllustrator and Illustrator could very well be the same thing.
We criticize MS every time they over-use the word "innovation", why not practice some innovation of your own and actually spend ten seconds thinking of a new name.
Yes, you might be able to claim "illustrator" is a generic term, but seeing as how the program has been around for 15 years and is the market leader, I think a court would give Adobe the benefit of the doubt in deference to the consumer identification of the name with their product. They're hardly trying to stop the use of the word everywhere -- only where it is blatantly obvious that its an intended ripoff of their product identification in vector graphics application software market.
---------------------------------------------
Hey, I'm not agreeing with their tactics, just pointing out that (despite seeming contradiction by their pollution) they might be successful for their immediate goal (which was to keep the trees from being cut, and perhaps to discourage companies from wasting time and money trying again)...
---------------------------------------------
but the wackjobs who were out there burned up a bunch of logging equipment, effectively releasing all sorts of toxins into the air and spilling diesel and motor oil all over the ground.
So it sounds liek they were successful.
As nasty as the brief pollution may have been, the trees stood a better chance of surviving than if the logging equipment had remained intact, now wouldn't they?
---------------------------------------------
Well, we're getting tired of the "have-nots" dictating to the rest of us what is and isn't fair, and using a government that we finance as an mechanism for preventing us from living the lives we choose
History would dictate that self-preservation alone should motivate the upper classes to temper the conspicuousness of their consumption (and the obnoxiousness of their contempt).
There's a lot more poor people than rich people, and the poor people have little to lose.
When the poor people are convinced that the rich are depriving them of living the lives THEY choose, there's usually big trouble...
---------------------------------------------
The fall in Microsoft's share price after Judge Jackson's ruling was quite obviously a result of that ruling. A 'fine' wouldn't have been any different, and most Microsoft shareholders would still have placed more of the blame on Jackson (for ruling to fine the company) than on the Microsoft board
No, that's completely wrong and ignores human behavior.
Number one -- a fall in stock price is not the same as a fine because you don't have to sell the stock, you can simply ignore it and wait for the stock to go back up.
Number two -- if someone recieves a notice that their fine of $50 (while possibly much lower than a drop in stock price) is due to the court by XX date, or they personally face contempt of court charges, then it becomes a personal issue.
They actually care about it and see that their own individual well-being is tied to the company on the downside as well as the upside. you can no longer simply take your money and run, you have to actually face responsibility for the company you own.
if Bill Gates or Rupert Murdoch faced 55% of the jail term for corporate criminal violations of the law, perhaps they would police their companies better for violations of law. if they faced 55% of the financial liabilty for the companies in civil case, they might be more concerned about following the law.
As it stands, the worst that can happen is that the company gets a stern *tsk, tsk* from a court, maybe even broken up, but other than stock value, the investors never face any real personal ramifications despite their very real personal ability to influence those violations of law...
---------------------------------------------
This is essentially what happens when the value of a company's stock falls due to a pending judgement
But ther's no direct correlation for the stockholders to say, "hey, you shouldn't have done this because I was held responsible for your bad decisions". The issue is responsibility, not money...
---------------------------------------------
Corporations are artificial citizens. Who would you levy a criminal judgement upon? The CEO? The whole board? All of the stockholders?
Why not? After all, these are the beneficiaries of the illegal conduct. The "corporation" doesn't get anything out of it, only the people making money.
When every stock investor starts getting notices from the court that they need to send in a check for $50 as punishment, maybe we'll finally have worked out an incentive for companies to stop violating the law. No longer will the board be able to say, "well, we have to maximize profits at all costs", they might have to consider how angry stockholders would get to be held personally responsible for their illegal actions.
---------------------------------------------
since the trademark was not in force when the second product came out,
The trademark WAS in force -- it was publically marked with a (TM), which is adequate notice for a trademark.
The filing of paperwork to get the (R) doesn't have to precede the use of the mark. in fact, when you file the paperwork for a trademark registration, the first thing they want to know is "has this mark been used in interstate trade? Please provide copies of such examples."
---------------------------------------------
Actually they are saying that they can't use the term "instant messaging" also.. they trademarked that as well
And its still just as arguable. I'm not saying to roll over for any trademark -- Instant Messaging could be reasonably argued to simply be a description of what the product does.
But to incorporate the "A" of AIM, when it clearly stands for AOL Instant Messnger, is just asking to be sued for infringement, and there's no hope of winning THAT argument in front of a judge.
---------------------------------------------
I'm going to say that it depends.
... the same response from art professors ... and from other schools"
:P
As a professional artist who is plenty familiar with computers, I confess that I have seen darn few computer works that I would consider much more than graphic design or technical exercises, so your professors and critics aren't coming out of left field.
Wholly computer-generated works that rise to the level of fine art could probably be counted on a few fingers (though I can't think of any of the top of my head).
Works of fine art with computers which are NOT wholly computer-generated, however, are more abundant. Montage and collage have entered a whole new era thanks to the flexibility in computers that the physical materials don't have.
"The art critics
This quote could have come from practically any time before a new art movement took place. So be heartened that you may be the lucky one to prove them all fools and secure your spot in history -- not many have the opportunity to do so, and since computers aren't disappearing anytime soon, I would consider it inevitable that SOMEONE will indeed take advantage of the tools to create new works that we consider fine art.
The bad news is that this isn't a medium, its a tool much more general than that. So first you'll have to figure out *something* more specific than just "computer-generated" to begin a meaningful search.
It would be as if flat surfaces were invented for the first time, you would still have the option of all your mediums, all your surfaces, all your techniques. You couldn't call cave-painting "THE way of making art on a flat surface" any more than you could say duck canvas cloth is defined by oil painting (or vice-versa).
Computers don't impose any limitation analogous to those you see in "normal" fine arts -- not in technique, or method, or time or space or even which sense(s) you appeal to. So there's a heck of a lot of decisions you'll have to make to even start experimenting.
And there's a heck of a lot of learning and experiencing we'll have to do to get to the point where people can recognize that what is being created isn't merely a program or a mathematical equation, but has the requisite creativity and emotive content to be admitted to the club of "fine art".
It took several decades for the fine art world to accept the notion of using acrylic paints instead of oil -- you might be overly optimistic to anticipate them embracing an entirely new way of doing EVERYTHING in the short few years that it has even been possible.
And we'll long have to fight the notion that somehow the computer is doing the real "creating".
So yes, you're right, but you better have some damn good work to back it up if you want to change the world and convince everyone else of it
Nathaniel
(Why do I have a terrible suspicion that this story will inspire links to the most horrid examples of amateurish CGI and filter-abused GIMP work imaginable?)
---------------------------------------------
oops, sorry 'bout that bold, didn't mean to yell!
---------------------------------------------
Could you create a competing television network to NBC, and call it ABC
Yes, because they are both Broadcasting Companies so it is pretty easy to defend.
GAIM is not a "G" AOL Instant Messenger. The AOL part kinda infringes. If they called themselves GIM, it would be a totally different story.
---------------------------------------------
With all due respect to your attorney who believes that ""gaim" and others are not confusingly similar to "aim", he's completely wrong.
You are in the same market as AOL, with a similar product to what AOL produces. They are the market leader, and you took their product name and added a single letter to it. I simply cannot imagine a more straightforward example of why trademarks exist.
Consumer confusion is practically guaranteed between "gaim" and "aim" if they both do the same thing.
And yes, even if they registered the trademark later, they were using the mark in interstate trade (and denoting it as a trademark) from the beginning, so the date of the registration is at MOST an inconvenience for AOL's attorneys -- they still own the mark.
It would be one thing if you called it "GIM", because "Instant Messenger" could at least be argued to be a generic term. But to call it anything with "AIM" was just begging for AOL to come knocking...
---------------------------------------------
The statements imply a significant amount of risk based on running Seti@Home.
No, it doesn't. It implies that the amount of risk is too great compared to the possible benefit.
Even though the risk is trivial, and possibly close to zero, the "benefit" to the TVA for running the software is most certainly zero, seeing as how the only purpose the sotware serves is to suck up system resources.
---------------------------------------------
As cheap as PCs are, you'd think that TVA would have separate internet/email PCs on every desktop
Sure, why not? It's only our tax dollars...
---------------------------------------------
believe me, im as baffled as you. +5 this ain't...
---------------------------------------------
now it seems that Microsoft is seeking to place itself in total control of what format we use on the Internet to view anything
That's shocking! What, have they developed some sort of ultra-secret "explorer for the internet" application that can be used to view web pages?
Is there some "media player for windows" that will be provided with every copy of their OSes?
Nexy you'll tell me they have even built an "encoder" of some sort for this strange new audio technology.
Its a good thing AOL has discovered this secret, nefarious plot and warned us all in advance!...
---------------------------------------------
I hate to be overly critical, but why the hell aren't these idiots moving?
They're not married, dont' have kids in school or a house or anything else to tie them down. There is no sane reason any one of these morons should be staying in a homeless shelter taking up space and food that a truly needy person could use.
News flash: its an expensive city, and there are about a million other people with your exact qualifications looking for the same jobs in that city. All the companies in that city are not hiring for those jobs because they are the ones who laid you off in the first place!
I know that folks in NYC and Silicon Valley can be myopic about the world, but to stick around in a homeless shelter when plenty of other cities and states are still desperate for tech workers is sheer lunacy.
This is like guys who actually get upset because they cant pick up a girl at a strip club. No kidding, did it occur to you that a thousand guys a day ask that girl for her number? Why don't you TRY SOMEWHERE ELSE where the odds are a little better?
---------------------------------------------
Cheaters sometimes win?
Yeah, right, next you'll tell me that winners sometimes use drugs.
Sorry, michael, but we had a lot of school assemblies about this and you're just wrong.
---------------------------------------------
Any business doing business in a country is bound by the laws of that country.
All of Yahoo (.fr or not) is bound by French laws for business they do in France. They are not bound by French law for business they do outside of France. If they don't want to obey French law, they can just stop selling things to people in France, or from people in France, and wash their hands of it.
Look at it this way: there are many places in Japan to purchase what in the US would be considered child pornography. So companies that sell that stuff in Japan don't sell it in the US, even if they sell other products in the US. They are bound by US law for business they do in the US, but have every right to cintinue selling that stuff in Japan.
---------------------------------------------
France has NO business telling an american company what it can do for a business practice
They're not. They're telling a French subsidiary of an American company, as well as the company itself, that to do business in France they must comply with the business laws of France. They don't have to obey French laws if they don't do business in France.
This is first semester international business and the more Yahoo complains the more Americans look like arrogant idiots.
---------------------------------------------