Freecycle is going downhill in a big way

[cjsmith]

I just got an "admin" post from our local list admin. He's laying down a big pile of rules about how not to use the word "freecycle" in a sentence.

Apparently, despite the fact that it seems to have been chosen for the closest possible resemblance to the word "recycle", it is *against the rules* to use it as a verb. Not only do they think they can enforce this, they think it's a good idea to try.

The last example indicates they don't want it to be a noun, either.

This is one of the strongest examples of "rules for the sake of rules, and for no other good reason" I've seen in a long time. All together now: SHEESH.

Let's just say if the Freecycle folks start kicking people out for recognizing the cleverness that THEY THEMSELVES STARTED with the choice of word, I'm going to start giving things away for free in a far less organized manner.

Comments

[anmorata.livejournal.com]

I believe that some of the local list admins get some sort of ridiculous superiority complex. I had that problem with one of the local list mods in Illinois, and I let her know about it. Of course, since she's Ms. High and Mighty, she ignored me and changed my posting status to moderated. Yeah, real mature there. :P

I wonder if the list mods can be reported on a state level? I know that there was a list in Illinois for moderating the list mods, and designating which areas could participate in Freecycle.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

So far this guy has seemed pretty good. I'm disappointed in this new development. It's sad that some areas get an uglier view of Freecycle because of a pissy local mod.

Speaking of areas, designating which areas could participate in Freecycle sounds pretty awful. That right there says we (national "we") need a whole new organization. If this organization believed in the usefulness of the idea rather than in power, there'd be no reason any region shouldn't be able to opt in.

[joedecker.livejournal.com]

Is "freecycle" trademarked? Can one simply start ones own apostate freecycle list?

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

It is trademarked. That was the essence of this guy's mail: it's trademarked, therefore follow our rules about its use.

Notably, the rules had nothing to do with marking the word with TM. They're about parts of speech.

[joedecker.livejournal.com]

Blame their lawyers. Trademarks need to be used as adjectives for best protection, you can see this by examining, for example, page 3 of this document from Adobe (http://www.adobe.com/misc/pdfs/TM_GuideforThirdPFina_print.pdf) [PDF], from which the relevant phrase is "Adobe trademarks must always be used
as adjectives followed by a generic term (such as "software"), and never as nouns or verbs.

See also the bottom of page 2 of this set of trademark dos and don't.s (http://www.iterations.com/public/ip/TM_Dos_and_Donts.pdf)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Trademarks need to be used as adjectives for best protection

That seems pretty random and arbitrary. Oh, well -- too bad for Freecycle. They were too clever with their choice of word and didn't think ahead about trademarks. I am sure they'll never manage to enforce rules like that on a word like this!

[joedecker.livejournal.com]

That seems pretty random and arbitrary. Oh, well -- too bad for Freecycle. They were too clever with their choice of word and didn't think ahead about trademarks. I am sure they'll never manage to enforce rules like that on a word like this!

Oh, it's ... damn stupid, arbitrary. I think the whole point is to avoid generification, they can sue people using the word they don't like so long as they make a consistent effort to try and get people to follow their rules. It does seem awfully corporate, if you ask me.



(

[platypus]

Hmm, has Google ever asked people to stop using their name as a verb?

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I suspect that the benefits of being a household word outweigh the benefits of getting people to use only adjectives and add TM all the time. I don't know for sure that I'm right about that, but Google is one of the few companies I'd expect to be smart enough to recognize and use that advantage.

[genderfur.livejournal.com]

the benefits of being a household word

Scotch Tape. Kleenex. Aspirin. Nylon. Speed-O.

Some companies would disagree with you. [g]

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Of course. Almost all companies disagree with me.

[vito-excalibur.livejournal.com]

They try really hard to get people to not use it as a generic verb. In other words, it's fine to say "Why don't we Google that?" but not to say "Why don't we google that on Yahoo?"

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

That makes loads of sense to me.

[joedecker.livejournal.com]

"Use the trademark ONLY as an adjective, NEVER as a noun or verb, and NEVER in the plural or possessive form." -Google (http://www.google.com/permissions/trademarks.html)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Darn. I thought they'd be nontraditional enough to take the tradeoff. There goes my image of 'em!

[vito-excalibur.livejournal.com]

Huh. How very odd!

[joedecker.livejournal.com]

Yes. (http://www.google.com/permissions/trademarks.html)

[dieppe.livejournal.com]

Ah, I think you just Photoshopped those to make a point... *cough* ;)

[platypus]

It's like the way the Lego box always begged you to call them "Lego bricks" instead of "Legos"!

[genderfur.livejournal.com]

Um? Trademarked? I've heard people using the word "freecycle" for awhile now. It's right up there with "precycling" (buying products on the basis of how you'll deal with their packaging).

Here in the bay area, there's a lesbian mailing list that's years old now, and a LOT of 'freecycling' goes on on that list. It's less useful b/c the women are spread out all over the very-much-greater-bay-area.

Also, my darling wife Bean is on 2 freecycle lists: the Oakland one and the East Bay one. She says that one of them is a ton more useful than the other. Fwiw. She *also* says that people keep posting, looking for certain things. Which would be fine if it were cardboard boxes, or something. But she keeps seeing posts saying things like "Does anyone have a spare ticket to Europe lying around?" and that's just so stoopid.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yep, trademarked. Sigh.

I can definitely see that the lists could vary widely in usefulness. And yeah, I do wish some folks who "neeeeeeeeeed" luxuries or a whole household of furniture (but never have anything to offer) would quit posting. :)

[melanie.livejournal.com]

you going to email something along these lines to teh list in response?

SHEESH.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I was thinking of sending mail to the administrator, but I suspect this wasn't his idea and there's not much he can do about it. The legal folks are saying "to protect your trademark, tell everyone these things, even though they fly in the face of common sense." So he told us. :-/

[datagoddess.livejournal.com]

Our local admin hasn't done anything like that, at least that I've noticed. I see the point, but sheesh.

[firecat]

Fortunately the freecycle lists I'm on haven't been making an issue out of this. Since proper trademark use is a big issue at a company I'm contracting for at the moment, I'm just as glad not to encounter it anywhere else.

An evil, evil thought

[elflet.livejournal.com]

Maybe it's 'cause I'm home sick (an awful case of bronchitis), but I starrted thinking of how to use "freecycle" as an adjective in ways they really wouldn't like. Things like "I woke up this morning with the worst freecycling virus you've ever seen -- I couldn't even _think_ about breakfast!"

Re: An evil, evil thought

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

That's a freecycling EVIL idea! :-)

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

This post would probably make so much more sense if I had any idea what "freecycle" was. :) But all the stuff about trademarks and adjectives was nonetheless quite interesting to read. Cool.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Heh, a link: Freecycle

But yeah. I had no idea about all this trademark stuff.

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

Ah, interesting. Nice idea, though I probably already have enough of my own crap. :)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I edited the post to add the link.

enough of my own crap

Therein lies the charm - you can also give crap away! So far, I think I've given more away than I've gotten. Or maybe I'm in denial. Shh, don't tell me.

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's true. I like the idea of giving stuff away, although I tend to think of stuff I don't use as useless crap, whereas stuff other people don't use is potentially useful crap. :) Although it tends to make the transition pretty easily once it's in my house. ;)

But I may check it out. We're getting ready to do some serious cleaning out of the storage area (especially since it's supposed to be something else) so we can do some work in there, so I may have to go through and see if there's anything someone else might be able to use. If nothing else, it will likely be a good blueprint for what needs to be done anyway.