Eric McCoy
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Hey guys,
I need a little advice and where better to gain a vast amount from so many walks of life. Back in June of 2009, Facebook offered custom user names on a first come first serve basis. They also stated in their guidelines that these user names could never be changed or moved from the initial awarded party. I’ve been in the auto glass replacement industry for 26 years. Naturally I made sure and secured the name “autoglass”
Imagine my surprise when the user name autoglass no longer pointed to my page but stripped from me and awarded to the largest auto glass replacement company in the world owned by Belron Intl. No communication from FB whatsoever. I saw the value in social media and the name auto glass and made sure I grabbed that name.
After a maze of investigation I finally contacted FB and the response I received was a web of contradictory BS! It seems as though that Belron wanted the name and convinced FB to give it up. I thought initially to myself that FB is a free service but then logic set in. It is in fact a provided service but being that they track all of my moves for advertisers, I feel it’s a two way street. I get to use the service for free at the expense of opening my thoughts to advertisers.
Bottom line is that I want that name back! Do I have any legal recourse here? Obviously Belron wanted that name for monetary purposes as is why I made sure I secured the name back in June 09. Any thoughts??
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James Chapman
155,750
Insider Points
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Yay Amy… That would be awesome! Thanks!
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Amy Reed
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Chappy – I may have to go on FB and like your page! More support for the competition.
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Eric McCoy
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Ralph,
You’re right they have the resources! Belron operates in 23 countries and owns numerous very large corporations and well known brands in the US. As far as the trademark goes, from what I understand the term “auto glass” is not able to be trademarked in the US. Not sure how that works anywhere else. I could be wrong in that statement. Thanks for the response Ralph, I appreciate it!
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Ralph Machesky
69,000
Insider Points
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Eric-
Same type of issues happen on Twitter. If a large Corp. with a trademarked and well known industry name wants to secure and affirm thier place in social media, they will do it. Same thing happens with domain names. Have seen this over and over. Basically they considered you a ‘squatter’ and abruptly yanked the rug out from beneath your feet. Not saying it’s fair, but it’s also how the new patent laws are going to work. You may have had that name for sometime, but XYZ Corp has way more resources and money and they intend to use it. This is why changing laws for the sake of change is not a good thing… ever. There has to be an compelling reason besidses lining someone elses pocketbook. Sorry to hear about this, what a way to start 2012!
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Eric McCoy
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Chappy,
This was a little different. No fans were required to grab the usernames. I’ve had the name for almost two years. It was outlined as a first come first serve basis. This is a story of David vs. Goliath. FB…a billion dollar entity, Belron a billion dollar entity verse a small mom and pop auto glass replacement company. I doubt I’ll make any progress in the quest to get that name back. It would simply be a feather in my cap to have it. That the little guy had the foresight to secure the name and the billion dollar corp. didn’t. HAHA
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Beadle Rock
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Eric
Please send me a friend request so I can e-mail you. I found a domain name you should seriously consider that I think could get you a lot more business than you could ever get through facebook, but I don’t want to post it here!
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James Chapman
155,750
Insider Points
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Hey Eric,
I have a couple pages on facebook too and for one of them have secured a name. Then another guy secured the same name as mine www.facebook.com/365thingstodoinnaples. He started the same name page but in order to get the vanity plate you have to have 25 fans. The race was to 25 fans & I won that one. I just had to out perform his page and get the activity in order to out rank his page.
I am not sure if that is the same situation but that is my experience. I will share more details if that is what you are looking for.
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