Facebook: De"face"ing the internet

[Evil the White]

It's finally happened. Facebook are trying to buy the English language.

 

[Nalesnik]

No, this trademark will have literally NO IMPACT on you, or me, or anyone whatsoever, unless your trying to create your own commercial social networking site with the word "face" in the title. If you need something serious to worry about, then worry about for-profit bio-pharmaceutical companies trying to patent human and animal genes. They're basically trying to take over control of the future of the healthcare industry, which is quite a scary though.

Edit: yea, I've been ninja'd. The webz move fast.

 

[Cpt_Oblivious]

So I can't say "face" on the internet?

You must be shitting me. It'll be interesting to see how they get most of the internet to pay for using the word "face". My bet is that they won't get shit.

I'd change my name on Facebook to "Face McFace".

Can I be your evil/lesser known twin?

Of course you can.

 

[PedroSteckecilo]

As I understand Trademarks this doesn't mean that you can't use the word "Face" just that you couldn't start a message board or online communication service that incorporates "Face" into it's name. Hence you couldn't come up with a service called "Face-Time" or "About-Face" or anything similar that offers a service similar to Facebook, however you could have a visual design website called "About-Face" or "Face-Time" since it's not about "message transmission". It's basically Facebook protecting its name from competitors and knock-offs, like how the Wii tademarked Wii, Cii, Zii, Vii etc. so it would be harder to create a knock-off and confuse their customers.

Edit: Uhhh, third times a charm I guess >.>

 

[Baldry]

So what happens to the movie "face-off"?

AND HELL I don't even use the word face, well frequently anyway!

 

[Snake Plissken]

Oooh...ooooh... totally relevant!

 

[Geekosaurus]

It just wont happen.

 

[no one really]

Electronic bulletin boards... forums? Online chat rooms... MSN? IRC? AIM? Would that make uses such as 'facepalm' obsolete?

... They may take our lives, but they will never take - OUR FACEPALMS!

I like my facepalms :'(

 

[Celtic_Kerr]

-SNIPZORZ-

It will fail. You cannot simply trademark a noun. Face is a noun. Think of it, if someone made a program where you could put a celebrity face on top of your own and called it "Pick-a-face" they could be sued...

trademark office won't allow that. It's too common a word.

 

[TheEndlessSleep]

This is one of the most ridiculous and unecessary things I have ever heard. How the hell will they police this?

Btw guys... I'm patenting the word 'and'...

1...
2...
3...

I'll take my $10000000000000000 in royalties now, internet users...

 

[Ekonk]

FACE FACE FACE FACE FACE

Sue me, Facebook.

 

[The Rockerfly]

How on earth can they do that? The word "face" was not created by them, therefore how can they claim legal ownership over it

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

Facebook doesn't deserve this. If this passes...

I better get the word out of my system now.

Spoiler: Face...etc

Face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face,face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face, face... Okay, I'm done.

 

[nofear220]

I live in Canada, so I'm not sure if the US can regulate what I say, because I am not a citizen of their country. If they apparently can regulate what I say, then what the fuck is wrong with the world... Mark Zuckerberg can go fuck *cough* 'face' himself.

 

[Choppaduel]

FACE

I think the points been made already, but i'll reiterate. Public domain needs lawyers too, but because theres not money in it, the lawyers will always be more willing to represent the corporations.

 

[Choppaduel]

Reminds me of Magic the Gathering trademarking the word "Tapping" -_-

Lol. Gonna tap that ass. But it'll cost me 5 red mana.

i lold.

nice one Xzi.

 

[Harbinger_]

Facebook.
Everyone has one, right? Or at least, that's the assumption. It has managed to worm its way into everyone's head, whether we have an account or not. But little do we realize, it's worming its way further than we think.

You see, Facebook is now one step closer to trademarking the word "face." Or, at least in certain situations. They put in an application for this in 2005. Little was heard, and it was assumed this attempt was dead. However, on Tuesday, the widely successful company has heard back. Facebook has received a "notice of allowance" from the US Patent and Trademark Office. For those of you unaware, this means that Facebook now has six months to show it uses the trademark, along with paying a 100$ fee. (Alternatively, it could file for a 36 month extension.) Once that's over, the trademark will be either approved or rejected.

But how would that affect you if it's approved? Aside from letting you know that all you need is a lot of money and power in the internet world to trademark a common word, it'll also affect this worrisome instance:

Even if it's approved, Facebook wouldn't have a trademark on "face" in every instance, only in online chat rooms and electronic bulletin boards for the "transmission of messages among computer users in the field of general interest and concerning social and entertainment subject matter," according to the Patent and Trademark Office's database entry on the application.

Electronic bulletin boards... forums? Online chat rooms... MSN? IRC? AIM? Would that make uses such as 'facepalm' obsolete? What about about 'The many faces of the Escapist'? No, no more picture threads for you, my friends. At least, not with the word 'face' in it.

However:

It oddly exempts uses "primarily featuring or relating to motoring or to cars."

Phew. You had me worried there, Facebook. I was worried I wouldn't be able to discuss how my new car is faceing this nice Canadian winter.
So, don?t worry. You can still use "face" in the context as "to face something" if this thing passes. You just can't talk about it online in a transmission of messages concerning anything considered 'general interest.' So basically, you can't use it and be having fun online.

[Interesting note, though. Since this request was filed back in 2005, not one single person has filed an opposition to this proposed trademark.]

So what are your thoughts? Should anyone be allowed to trademark common words? Is Facebook getting too cocky for their own good? Should we revolt and change all references to Facebook as Creepbook (or other such terms)?

Source [http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2010/11/25/facebook-trademark-face.html].

Edit:
While I admit to being slightly sarcastic about never being able to use the word "face" online after this will pass, I will plead artistic license on the basis I do not know how the US trademark laws work. Also, it seemed the sensible thing to do.

However, that doesn't take away from the fact that trademarking the word "face" would limit quite a lot of other companies from using it. Face is a common word, it would significantly impact business markets to have that no longer accessible to them. What about FaceCash [http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/03/facebook-facecash-aaron-greenspan-mobile-payments/]? Facebook seems relentless to keeping people off any sort of similar name.

In August, it filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against Teachbook.com, an online community for teachers.

That was teachers, people.

I'm surprised that CBC got ahold of this first. They're usually kinda slow with the news. Seems kind of silly you can trademark a word found in the dictionary.

 

[EightGaugeHippo]

I don't think anyone should be allowed to trademark a common word, no. I think, in order to trademark ANY word, you should have had to come up with it yourself.

QFT

Only Flooths who Creeagalate a Dardosliil Should be allowed to Geapflarket said Dardosiil.

Spoiler: Translation

Only people who create a word Should be allowed to trademark said word.

 

[Empireth]

I'm pretty sure they aren't trademarking the word face in general discussion, impossible, rather the use of the word face as a name for an application or object, so while I can say " my face hurts", I can't set up a system such as, upload pictures to the facerec, to find identities of people in pictures online

Well, yes. As I'd noted in my edit, I was... maybe exaggerating a little. However, it was to get my point across.
I mean, really. They're trying to trademark a very commonly used word. How could that be allowed to happen? They didn't invent the word, they didn't invent the usage of Face____. Yet, for some reason, this multi-billion dollar company has decided that even though they're billionaires and have made slaves of more than 500 million active users. (Of which, half are almost always guaranteed to log in on any given day.)
Think about that. They have made such a big impact. And they're wanting more?
Why, so they can insure that even though they made this much money, they won't ever make less than that? It makes me wonder: what if MySpace had originally been named MyFace? What would the impacts be? Would Facebook be allowed to go through on this Trademarking even though something almost exactly the same had been there first (and failed)?

Nope. Wrong. Not how trademark law works. If it passes (and of course with a little green grease everything passes in the 'land of the free as long as you've got shit loads of money') it'll just mean that no-one else in the relatively similar business of online communications will be able to trade using the word 'Face'. It's no different to The Escapist's trademarking of 'The Escapist'. Don't be hysterical and do just the first little bit of research (read wikipedia) before writing articles here expounding your ignorance to others please.

I wasn't being hysterical. I was exaggerating to clearly state the ridiculousness of this situation.

Using your example, I shall explain:
The Escapist is a registered trademark. As is Facebook. But Facebook wants to go a little bit further. Facebook also wants to trademark "face". To make this equivalent with your example, it would be like The Escapist trademarking the word "the" to keep people from creating other sites and forums named The _____.

(But if I did happen to be "expounding [my] ignorance on others" I would trust you people to kindly point out why my point of view is wrong. With explanations.)

Does this mean the website Faceparty is fucked?

Based on the fact that in my source it mentioned that FaceCash had asked for more time to form a rebuttal [small](but, seriously? It's been five years, where've you been, FaceCash? You should've been aware of this attempt a long time ago)[/small] I would assume so, yes. I don't think this Face____ nonsense will be limited to social media (again, looking at FaceCash being a different way to transfer money. Like Paypal.) especially since

"transmission of messages among computer users in the field of general interest and concerning social and entertainment subject matter," [in online chat rooms and electronic bulletin boards].

is such a loose definition. An electronic bulletin board could include forums, especially since they really are a transmission of messages among users in a field of general interest.
And I think we can all agree that Facebook != a forum.

Um, guys?

It would prohibit any other company using "Face*blank*" or "*blank*face". Sheesh.

Quite certainly. But have you really thought about that fact? Have you thought about the injustice that a multi-billion dollar company can suddenly decide that no other company can include a common term?

Say a yoga company called "New Life" had a website. Say New Life was so successful they wanted to trademark more than just "New Life". They also want to trademark "life". Well, that would certainly screw some people over. Sunlife Financial? Screw them, they've got 'life' in their name. They owe New Life money. What's that? They've been a successful company for longer than New Life? No, that doesn't get taken into account.

The fact that you put "sheesh" into your post makes it sound like you really don't care. How do you know what you will want to do further down the line? How do you know you won't want to plan on building a company and you'll want to name it something that involves a common noun that has been trademarked by another company?
The fact that Facebook might get away with trademarking "face" could merely be the beginning. If they are successful in doing so, soon other companies will follow suit, knowing it's possible. And soon so many common words will no longer be able to be used in company names.

The snowball effect this would have is ludicrous.

No, this trademark will have literally NO IMPACT on you, or me, or anyone whatsoever, unless your trying to create your own commercial social networking site with the word "face" in the title. If you need something serious to worry about, then worry about for-profit bio-pharmaceutical companies trying to patent human and animal genes. They're basically trying to take over control of the future of the healthcare industry, which is quite a scary though.

Edit: yea, I've been ninja'd. The webz move fast.

For this, please see some of my above responses. Based on the wording, I don't think the trademark would be simply limited to social networking sites. It sounds like almost all companies that will be comprised of message boards (ie, forums as well) or online chatrooms will also be affected.

And when you add in the snowball effect I mentioned, what with other companies surely following suit were this to pass... It begins to look like a fairly bleak future for companies. The amount of laws that would need to be passed through would be ridiculous.

And I was by no means belittling the extremely worrisome fact that they're trying to patent the human genome. I mean, the genome that they decoded was merely one person's. How could a company own what that person actually is? I assure you, this is not something I have been ignoring. However, that was not the issue that I addressed in this thread.

As I understand Trademarks this doesn't mean that you can't use the word "Face" just that you couldn't start a message board or online communication service that incorporates "Face" into it's name. Hence you couldn't come up with a service called "Face-Time" or "About-Face" or anything similar that offers a service similar to Facebook, however you could have a visual design website called "About-Face" or "Face-Time" since it's not about "message transmission". It's basically Facebook protecting its name from competitors and knock-offs, like how the Wii tademarked Wii, Cii, Zii, Vii etc. so it would be harder to create a knock-off and confuse their customers.

Edit: Uhhh, third times a charm I guess >.>

Oh, definitely. But the problem becomes that "About-Face" would not be related, in my mind, to "Facebook" were they both companies. Especially if "About-Face" was a message board, and "Facebook" being... well, facebook.

The loose definition that was stated about it being about "general interest" also becomes arguable. Anything in the world could be general interest for a group of people. Absolutely anything. It merely depends who I'm addressing at that point.

And again, I cannot seem to reiterate my point that if Facebook becomes successful, no doubt other companies will follow suit. And then it will just become a nightmare of a conundrum. Which brings a question to mind: if this happens, will they also start trademarking words in other languages that hold the same meaning? Will Facebook one day also trademark "LivreduFace" or simply the word "livre" ? (Livre is book in French, for those who don't know.) And if so, where will they draw the line?
This issue will just keep multiplying in size as time goes on.

 

[MasterKirov]

Reminds me of Magic the Gathering trademarking the word "Tapping" -_-

Lol. Gonna tap that ass. But it'll cost me 5 red mana.

Great, we owe them money now don't we?