What’s In a Name?
I was recently catching up on some of my mailing list reading when I noticed the following from Ilyse Kazar.
[ANN] New content on datatude.network
Hello to all –
Among the various forums on the datatude.network bulletin board at http://network.datatude.net is a group of topics under the purview of "The FileMaker Collective" (TFC), a group of privately-selected top notch FileMaker Pro experts who have been invited to blog and to post what we hope will evolve into one of the most complete and accurate repositories for technical knowledge and suggested Best Practices.
I recently let all of my "collective" domain names expire since they
were serving no greater purpose than facilitating the transfer of a few
dollars from my credit card into the coffers of GoDaddy.com. I
suggested Ernest use "fmcollective.com" becuase it was liberalish
sounding which I knew would encourage the esteemed Reverend Blackwell
to contribute some of his thoughts to this forum. It appears Ilyse was on the same wavelength as we were, even as far as choosing the same name.
The question now is how to reconcile the two competing uses of the name. Unfortunately she’s a friend of mine so I can’t sue her and while she didn’t select me as one of her "group of privately-selected top notch FileMaker Pro experts" I’ll have to forgive her the slight. Perhaps we can hold a brownie bake-off with the winner exercising rights to the name.
I’m open to suggestions. Does one of us need to abandon the name or is there room for two FileMaker Collectives?
Corn Walker
This has happened to me before! I actually have been threatened with suit over the name of my company, which came to me in light-bulb format one day having nothing to do with having seen it anywhere else … and it turns out someone in Texas has a company of the same name. (Gladly in that case the examiner at USPTO agreed with me that mine was a noncompeting use, but sadly it cost me thousands of dollars to even be *threatened* with a suit … so, thanks Corn for not buying into that Sue Me Sue You mindset!)
ANYWAY. I wish I had known about this site earlier. Was there ever a public announcement made, or any announcements of ongoing discussions etc.?
I’m thinking I could change the name of the small datatude.network usergroup to “The Filemaker Consortium”. I like Collective better, but in legalese Corn/inResonance had “first use”, and at least Consortium would leave the initials as “TFC” which folks are starting to use (or are you guys using TFC as well??!)
By the way, Corn, I notice your post was on April 5 (I remember responding to your private email on this topic … I think I may just have wiped out the fact that you posted this here, too?) … are we the only ones here? Helloooooooooooo, anyone else home?
“regards to ” & (”one”) or (”one and all”)
:^D
Ilyse
Just a wild idea:
Maybe we can join forces. Except that I do prefer the forum format over wiki/blog that everyone can edit (and DELETE! as per the snake-oil entry I would have loved to read).
On the phpBB-run TFC forums at d.n., the TFC usergroup permissions are set up so that only TFC members can start a topic (for quality and content control) and any joe can respond with questions, opinions, etc. Nobody can delete anyone else’s post by accident.
And I do hope to find the time every Wednesday to post my ANN’s to the major lists regarding “new content”, which has been attracting good readership (some posts have over 500 reads already) and steadily growing registered forum members (over 100 in 5 or 6 weeks).
Anyhow. This is an open invitation, no need to reply here. Anyone working at inR is, I am sure, qualified to be a member of d.n’s TFC. AFAIK. IIRC. IMHO. ABCDEFGHIJK…
Ilyse
OK, *one* more comment and I WILL GO AWAY at least for a while.
Corn: Were you and I at two ends of the same neuron inside the mass-subconscious or something? Did we astrally project ourselves to lay our hands on the Princeton Black Box at the same moment, and therefore were being influenced by the same memes?
OK: my timeline:
I came up with The Name in late February 2006 while my boards were still under development, unannounced and with the entry URL unpublished.
I announced the boards on March 25.
I think you may have been (privately) developing this idea prior to what appears to be the very first post on fmcollective.com (looks like March 26, going by the Home page policy kind of post)
it’s a kind of spoooky synchronicity.
Please do reply to let me know your thoughts, and let’s work out somethin’!
I.
Hey I!
Apologies; I didn’t see your comments. We’ve been busy with real work as they say and have been a bit delinquent in checking this site. Wow! A comment from Ilyse. Wait, THREE comments from Ilyse. I feel blessed.
As for the name of this blog I am a bit ambivalent about the issue myself. I don’t mind changing this to something else but right now I am a bit too distracted by other matters to making Big Important Decisions.
And, no, there has been no big launch as of yet. For one, I haven’t rounded up guest authors although SH Blackwell has pledged contributions in theory. So, my thought is to sit on the problem for a couple more weeks. I think I should be able to come up with a name replacement by then. If I can’t, maybe we can duke it out over sushi or something.
What do you think?
Cheers,
Ernest Koe
I’ve been a bit remiss in checking, let alone posting to, the blog given my mad push to finish my house before July 1 (finish being a loosely defined word).
About four years ago I registered a number of domains at GoDaddy around the “collective” theme and only recently let them expire after having done nothing with them in those four years. When Ernest and I were tossing around the idea of the blog I suggested he use “fmcollective” but he registered the “.com” variant (which I had not registered).
As the USPTO would view it, while I might have had the first “conception of the invention” you had the first “reduction to practice.” I have a feeling they would prefer the bakeoff to litigation as well – let the best brownie win.
The other TFC has been renamed! Still “TFC” but now spelled out as The FileMaker Consortium. Regardless of “who came first” there was too much room for confusion and it was trivial to change the name of the group I started.
Ilyse