This isn't even the first time this has happened. Remember when they renamed Libra? I think they just assume it doesn't matter, and if it does, the settlement will be a blip. It doesn't always work out that way for them.

I'm just more surprised they didn't just buy out the company outright. That used to be Microsoft's thing...why bother, if I can just "embrace and extinguish" them?

They didn't want the company, they just want the trademark.

You know what comes with buying a company?

It's trademark.

The company was founded on it. It was "thefacebook.com" for years as it fought to get the domain name without "the". (Also, there were lots of face books at the time. Claiming "The" was a wild hair that also seemed to win PR for them.)

> Also, there were lots of face books at the time.

Trademark-wise, "Facebook" and "Book of Faces" are different things.

the term predates the company

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/facebook

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face_book

Same with Meta

Windows Metro

> I think they just assume it doesn't matter, and if it does, the settlement will be a blip. It doesn't always work out that way for them.

Yeah, they keep forgetting they still have to follow the law, because society hasn't yet collapsed into a cyberpunk dystopia where big corporations are totally above it.

Wonder how many offers or emails they sent to https://github.com/meta

Resource Burn. Meta can throw more money at any court case, so if the judge is bent, which happens, it can become a long drawn out process. Personally though, despite having the trademark for a trademark with the word "threads", note lowercase, its also got a logo filed which might complicate the situation. https://trademarks.ipo.gov.uk/ipo-tmcase/page/Results/1/UK00...

Plus they only have a few catagories selected from Class 9. https://trademarks.ipo.gov.uk/ipo-tmcase/page/History/1/UK00...

Personally I would have filed the logo and word seperately to avoid any confusion, otherwise situations like this court case could present themselves, but maybe that is/was the intention when it was filed.

NAL, but based on my armchair expertise it looks like an extremely hard case for Meta.

Any actual lawyers willing to chime in?

(Not a lawyer, but have gained some working knowledge of UK trademarks.)

I don’t think this is totally clean cut. UK trademarks are registered against specific classes and those classes are categorised in families of goods and services.

A quick search suggests that this company holds the trademark for the word ‘Threads’ for class 9 (goods) and class 42 (services).

You can read the definitions somewhere by searching on gov.uk (or somewhere like https://www.russell-cooke.co.uk/media/bmin5fo0/goods_and_ser... [pdf]).

Meta will almost certainly make the argument that they are not operating in these classes or overlapping with the categories listed for this trademark. Class 42 does not seem to apply here, and for class 9 the Thread trademark lists ‘computer software, software and apparatus for the extraction of business information and knowledge’ which may not overlap.

Meta couldn’t also trademark Threads under class 9 (can’t trademark the same word twice in the same class) but just because they can’t secure the trademark does not automatically mean they are infringing on the existing use.

They could argue that their use of Threads as a trademark falls solely within something like class 38: Telecommunications services; chat room services; portal services; e-mail services; providing user access to the Internet; radio and television broadcasting.

If they could land this then there is no claim against them - their use can coexist with trademark’s registered in different classes.

For an app which can be downloaded getting around class 9 could be difficult - so whether they could land and make this stick is far from clear, but Meta have the resources to explore this indefinitely where as the pre-existing user making the complaint may not be able to afford the legal costs to stay the course.

Trademarks are messy and subjective and there is much scope for interpretation - even a seemly clear-cut case is anything but predictable.

Lawyer in training here!

Trademarks do get grouped into classes (the so called "Nice Classification", like the French city [0]). The classes are very detailed, and the first 34 refer to "Goods", the rest to "Services".

Specifically class 9 refers to (among many other things), "computers, computer software", class 42 to "design and development of computer hardware and software".

However those are mostly just to simplify searching for and dealing with the huge amount of trademarks. Each trademark comes with its own list of goods and services it's supposed to cover. Their trademark in the UK [1] covers "computer software, software and apparatus for the extraction of business information and knowledge".

They also appear to have registered a trademark this september [2] with a much broader scope, so after Meta started using threads. I'm not familiar with UK law and how it relates to trademarks in this case, however.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_(Nice)_Classific... [1]: https://trademarks.ipo.gov.uk/ipo-tmcase/page/Results/1/UK00... [2]: https://trademarks.ipo.gov.uk/ipo-tmcase/page/Results/1/UK00...

The fact that Meta removed Threads Software from FB implies that Meta itself considered there to be a likelihood of confusion between the two. They should lose hard here.

I agree that does seem to be something of a smoking gun.

And it’s not without precedent to secure an injunction against as US tech company launching a new service - gmail was known as googlemail in the UK and some European countries for several years owing to a trademark dispute (https://www.theguardian.com/media/pda/2010/may/04/digital-me...)

But sadly a lot of trademark and copyright cases come down to who has the bigger pile of cash behind them.

Could they not argue that Threads was removed from FB because they refused to sell the domain or violated some TOC and not because of user confusion?

That first argument just sounds like bullying and may be anti-competitive business practices. IANAL but I think refusing a specific person's access to your product specifically because they refused to sign a separate contract with you would be seen as a pretty clear case of you abusing your market control and probably some form of coercion. I'd love to see FB declare that - but it's much more likely they'd stick to "Oh, violated our TOS for some reason".

"Oh? What?... Oops, The Algorithm banned your fanpage because it was flagged, wait, let me check, ah yes, multiple reports of trademark violation on behalf of... Meta? Oh that's us. I apologize, it seems our employees were ever so vigilant but didn't know your app is a thing. An innocent false positive, nothing more."

Those reasons sound even worse.

It's not necessary to sound better. All you need to do is win a legal battle.

You're not going to win by undermining the foundations of your own argument, but don't mind me - please pitch this to Meta's legal department.

I remember Microsoft having a clash with ASDA over the name of underwear "microsoft": https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-everywhere-except-un...

> I remember Microsoft having a clash with ASDA over the name of underwear "microsoft"

Though that's clear case of different industries.

Threads is a much more compelling case.

Funnily enough there are SEVERAL clothing businesses named "Threads".

Meta is in the business of class 9 “extraction of business information and knowledge” from users of the Threads app, and it can be plausibly claimed that either Meta’s Threads app is a source of class 9 business material at Meta, or that Meta must state formally that it does not collect business information and knowledge from the users of the Threads app, which obviously Meta cannot claim.

(I am not your lawyer, this is not legal advice.)

IANAL but they could also just pull out of the UK, and they have no jurisdiction on Meta in the USA.

They'd still be able to have users in the UK, since the UK isn't the type of country that is going to put up a national firewall.

I assume Facebook sells ads to UK business, which is something the UK could stop. They probably also have UK employees but I'm too lazy to confirm that.

Funny you mention that, because the UK (CMA) ordered Facebook to undo its acquisition of Giphy after it had already closed on the grounds that Giphy might potentially have entered the UK market and competed with Facebook had it not been acquired

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/oct/18/facebook-...

as long as they've traded in the US under that mark they'd be protected?

doesn't even need to be registered

The question is whether Facebook’s use is likely to confuse consumers: software isn’t a category of its own, everything is software now, and this is different software — any context immediately distinguishes the usages (and there’s no reputation for Facebook to be maliciously trying to leverage). I doubt Facebook will lose. The lawsuit is just chancing for a settlement based on it being easier for Facebook to settle than defend.

I think UK-wise it's likely to confuse consumers because Threads means post-nuclear wasteland there.

Threads: a stark contemplation of isolation and desolation, total population collapse… and I hear there’s a movie with the same name.

I can't really see how they won't.

Microsoft were forced to rename SkyDrive to OneDrive by BSkyB, a company with less in common with them than Meta/Threads Software Ltd.

Four offers! I'd love to see what those were. Any educated guesses?

No, but looking at the offering from Threads Software, it was probably the most value Threads Software founders were ever going to extract from the company.

It’s like the skit in The Office where the Washington school wanted to buy Ryan’s company purely for the name WUPHF.

Now Threads Software is going to have to deal with mountains of legal expenses which they will only recoup if they win (though they likely would eventually win, to be fair).

They might be able to find a lawyer to take this on contingency. Meta has very deep pockets and will pay plenty of money just to save the embarrassment .