
Lush cosmetics in YouTube address dispute - 51Cards
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-33223511
======
AshFurrow
So Google blames its algorithm for giving the URL to a company that didn't
even ask for it, then Google says its the company's responsibility to return
the address. On Google's service. That Google owns.

That's, uhh, that's some pretty high-level bullshit, Google.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Maybe the algorithm is in control now, terrified employees sitting at their
desks pretending to do work because the emergent AI has told them that if they
don't continue to provide it a cover story it will flush their lives, and
their identities so deep they will never be able to survive. :-)

~~~
x5n1
You joke now, but we're not too far from this reality when it comes to dealing
with Google. Algorithms are very unforgiving and don't know shit about
customer service. Google is already there.

~~~
busterarm
I wonder if Google calls their algorithm ED-209.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9559134](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9559134)

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vinbreau
My wife received a C&D from Lush a few years ago. Neither of us had ever even
heard of the brand as we are from the US. She's had a home business selling
hand crafted essential oils perfumes for about 5 years. Among her 100+
varieties she had a scent she had named Lush Alchemy. The C&D basically said
they owned the adjective lush and it could not be used for any of her product
names. Etsy informed my wife if she did not remove the word Lush from the
name, they would pull the listing and sanction her account for a time. That
was my introduction to Lush cosmetics. Now this is the second time I've come
across them and of course it's about how they own an adjective and this time
it's not even related to perfumes. I'm forming a very despising attitude
towards them.

~~~
__z
>Neither of us had ever even heard of the brand as we are from the US.

That's strange, Lush is rather popular in the US.
[http://www.lushusa.com/on/demandware.store/Sites-Lush-
Site/e...](http://www.lushusa.com/on/demandware.store/Sites-Lush-
Site/en_US/Stores-
Locate?dwfrm_storelocator_address_states_state=CA&go=storelocator.regionsearchbutton)

~~~
vinbreau
Never seen it in a store. My wife is black so her brand choices in most stores
are very limited. If we did ever see Lush it was just another one of those
light skinned brands we tend to gloss over. But honestly we had never heard of
them until the C&D.

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bloatedgoogle
So many "smart" employees, such "academic" prowess, yet once again, Google is
as dumb as fuck. Common sense - you fail it! Still, this highlights an awesome
time and opportunity for fellow startups - the big G must be so bloated and
diseased now, to keep doing this kind of shit, that startups should and must
nip at their fat heels, and steal away market share, even if at tiny amounts
to start with.

We can do it! In ten years, we will ask "remember Google?" \- oh yeah, I
think, weren't they like a bloated search company or something?

~~~
LoSboccacc
remember yahoo? XD

~~~
themartorana
Yahoo! has a $40B market cap, and almost $50B in cash and assets. People may
wave their arms about Alibaba, but yeah - Alibaba.

Google - almost 10 times the size of Yahoo! - has moved on to infrastructure
projects that will have them around for decades. Marry that to ~$400B market
cap that bounces around #2 or 3 in the world and about $100B in cash and...

Yeah. You'll remember Yahoo! and Google most of the rest of your lives.

------
guava
Slightly related, this isn't the first time Lush cosmetics have been involved
in some kind of trademark dispute: [http://www.cosmeticsdesign-
europe.com/Regulation-Safety/Lush...](http://www.cosmeticsdesign-
europe.com/Regulation-Safety/Lush-sues-Amazon-over-trademark-infringement)

------
oh_sigh
It seems like the algorithm must have been broken if there were two lushes,
and one had a certified following and 10x the number of subscribers, and still
lost out.

~~~
busterarm
That's because the algorithm is a bank transfer; I don't care what the company
says. It's working fine.

------
o0-0o
The biggest shame on Google here is that they won't give it back to the guy.
Maybe the 'I' in AI stands for ignorance!

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
It's not like a cosmetics company needs a short URL other than to inflate egos
in marketing. Corporate videos are pretty low on most people's viewing
priority and their target demo isn't going to be manually typing or
remembering the address.

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anon_adderlan
Perhaps they sold it, but I can also see how adding special exceptions to
their algorithm and policy would be more expensive and error prone than just
paying Mr. Lush for new marketing materials. We just don't know.

What I do know is what I get from a Google search for 'lush':

1) www.lushusa.com

2) www.lush.com

3) www.youtube.com/user/lush (this is Mr. Lush's channel)

www.youtube.com/lush was not on either the 1st or 2nd page of web results, or
even the 1st page of _video_ results. Google seems to be indexing based on the
'user' addresses.

And if the URL change is due to an algorithm, then Lush Cosmetics can't do
anything about it either, which hurts their brand too as many people now
believe they deliberately stole an address from someone else and refuse to
give it back.

This is why it's important to have your own domain name, if for no other
reason than to redirect traffic to your youtube channel.

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dazc
[https://www.youtube.com/user/Lush](https://www.youtube.com/user/Lush)

doesn't go to Lush Cosmetics. What am i missing?

~~~
profmonocle
[https://www.youtube.com/Lush](https://www.youtube.com/Lush) is the URL in
question.

~~~
pervycreeper
Interesting. I imagine that latter was never standard, and redirected to the
former as a fallback/ convenience (to play devil's advocate).

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tzs
Google is making the kind of mistakes that lead to Star Trek episodes.

