
Retraction from Tumblr - zachinglis
http://istumblrdown.com/retraction
======
alan_cx
Why no appreciation of the apology? If all people are going to do is find
fault with people apologizing, why bother? How should Tumblr reacted? What are
they supposed to do?

~~~
ben0x539
Why should we appreciate the apology? We might blame tumblr a little less now
than if they'd stayed their course, but I don't see why it should swing over
into appreciation of what they're doing.

Perceivedly, it happens a lot that big scary companies bully smaller entities
with meritless but expensive-to-fight legal threats. That sometimes there's
enough of a public notice of that to make the company reconsider and to limit
the damage done is just part of the game and doesn't really leave them without
blame, it just means they got "caught" this time.

~~~
aespinoza
I think you are missing the point here. It is stupid to blame Tumblr for all
the other big scary companies. They made a mistake. They apologized and fixed
the problem, and according to the apology they found a bug in their process
and fixed it.

Instead of bashing Tumblr for apologizing, we should be happy they retracted.
If HN was the reason why they retracted, then great. But let's stop looking
down on Tumblr purring ourselves at the top.

We are all at the same boat and same level. We are all trying to make our
companies work.

~~~
whistlerbrk
He is missing the point, it's not even his apology to accept, it's Zach's.
He's appeared to do since he considers the apology 'genuine'.

The thing to note in all this is:

"Our legal department very recently started using a third party vendor to
assist us in pursuing trademark infringers and, due to an error in our new
process, your domain was mistakenly caught in the cross-fire."

If tumblr has switched to yahoo! legal, that is not a nice side effect of the
acquisition.

~~~
ben0x539
> He is missing the point, it's not even his apology to accept, it's Zach's.

Of course it's not for me to accept or not accept that apology and no one
should care about my opinion on the matter. But I think not appreciating the
apology is a defensible position to take and I'm trying to articulate why I
feel so. Feel free to dismiss me. :)

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obilgic
That means, unless you are on HN's front page you don't have rights to use
word tumblr in your domain

~~~
bilalq
It's become an interesting phenomena now. The rise in availability of the
internet and pervasiveness of social media is making companies accountable for
their wrongdoings. Of course, the more prominent/visible the complaint, the
more likely it is that a company will try to act on it.

However, I don't believe that most companies would just handle problems like
this in a case by case basis. IsTumblrDown made some noise, and that noise led
Tumblr to recognizing a flaw in their process. At the very least, it'll make
them more cautious going forward. Incidents like this can lead to long-term
improvements.

~~~
raverbashing
Good

It means that legal departments have to stop the "shoot first ask questions
later" strategy

It's very easy to just go around threatening legal action against people
unchecked.

------
mayoff
It doesn't matter to Tumblr if HNers boycott Tumblr the web site.

It might matter to Tumblr if HNers boycott Tumblr the employer or Tumblr the
business partner.

~~~
mcintyre1994
It's also worth considering Yahoo! the employer or Yahoo! the business
partner.

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joeblau
So essentially, a legal team was spamming anything with the word tumblr in it?

~~~
cabalamat
> a legal team was spamming anything with the word tumblr in it

There ought to be some comeback on people who do this, just like there ought
to be for people who send out false DMCA takedown notices.

~~~
loceng
Lawyers basically say until a cease and desist is received (confirmed
received), then they've spent money and are serious.

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molecule
IsTumblrsLawsuitDown.com

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rlongstaff
The cynical reaction would be to say this is all about damage limitation to
their brand since it appeared on HN, as they meant to do it rather than it
being a 'clerical error'.

Good thing I'm not cynical.

~~~
saosebastiao
HN, and its readership, simply isn't that important to tumblr. If it were
reddit, maybe the cynical reaction would be accurate.

~~~
Zaheer
Yes it is. Tumblr's parent is Yahoo and Yahoo will be keen on being friendly
to the developer community to attract top talent. Much of which reads HN.

~~~
dylangs1030
I know it seems that way, but that's actually reddit and r/programming. Based
on sheer numbers, I think most engineers don't frequent Hacker News.

I was just at dinner with an ex-Zynga game dev last night who had never even
heard of it.

~~~
pearjuice
>ex-Zynga game dev

Well, he did say "top talent"!

~~~
dylangs1030
I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic, but it's unfair to judge someone's
ability based on where they used to work.

This friend of mine was laid off in New York and received his severance; based
on what I know about him, he could work in a multitude of places right now if
he wanted to.

Zynga's vilified image aside, there is no reason to believe their engineers
are not "top talent."

------
pearjuice
"So I'll be bringing it online in a few weeks again."

Wait, what? He gets to keep his product but post-pones its availability by a
"few weeks"? Opportunity missed. Or am I missing something?

~~~
zachinglis
It's not really a product. It's a page that says "Tumblr is up" or "Tumblr is
down." Very very niche and incredibly limited functionality.

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bowlofpetunias
> _...pursuing trademark infringers..._

That's the part they should be apologizing for.

Unless their business is actually getting hurt in any way (is someone selling
fake Chinese made Tumblr t-shirts on the black market?), this is just a
systematic exercise in corporate bullying.

They shouldn't be engaged in this in the first place. Tumblr is not friggin'
Nike.

~~~
sjtgraham
There's no choice in the matter. Do you realise trademark holders have to
vigorously defend their marks in order for them to remain protected? Failure
to do so jeopardises protection.

Disclaimer: IANAL

~~~
chadwickthebold
... and istumblrdown.com is somehow stealing tumblr's business?

~~~
a3n
Only when tumblr is down.

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sillysaurus2
This seems like a risky move for tumblr, no? Doesn't this mean they're not
actively defending their trademark? In which case this could cause them legal
problems in the future.

~~~
darrenkopp
IANAL, but to me it seems more like "we are actively defending our trademark
(ala the hiring of the legal company), but we do not believe that you are
infringing on that trademark and what you are doing is fair use, so carry on"

~~~
chimeracoder
DannyBee (who is a lawyer) pointed out in the thread last night that this
doesn't need to be "defended" against. He explained that, since they use the
term "Tumblr" to refer specifically to the real company Tumblr, and since it's
clear that they're not trying to masquerade as Tumblr or cause any confusion,
that this is a legitimate use of the term and does not need to be "defended
against" in order to protect the trademark.

~~~
pcwalton
The legal term here, incidentally, appears to be "nominative use". (I learned
a lot from that thread!)

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raverbashing
And by the way, this is not (mainly) because it was front page on HN.

HN users do not overlap (a lot) with the target audience for Tumblr. (not a
lot at least)

HN is of course an important news outlet in the industry.

~~~
DocG
true, but it is same with google reader. it is not profitable, but who is
target audience? the guys who install and recommend most of the software for
casual users. So in some cases, you need to please a smaller group, to win
over bigger group.

I think any company can win market, if your local it friend/guy starts
recommending you specific brand. For example, I changed 10 peoples mind how to
think about AV. They went over from AVG to MSE, because I recommended. Why?
Because, there is less chance for them to fuck it up and install trial.

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smegel
I wonder what the threshold is for pursuing trademark infringement...obviously
imposters but what else?

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kumarski
With our powers combined....

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solray
This is a classic case of TDC. (i.e. Tumblr Damage Control).

