Popular YouTubers Try To Trademark The Word 'React'

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You know, I used to like these guys. Hell, we even posts links to their videos from time to time but this is just stupid. :(

You can’t trademark the word “react.” Sure, the Fine Brothers have enjoyed lots of success and won millions of subscribers by posting videos of kids and old people reacting to all kinds of stuff. Now that they’ve gotten successful, they want to keep growing their empire and making more of that sweet YouTube money by franchising their recognized brand and format. But what the bros didn’t make terribly clear in their initial announcement was that they want to own the word “react” so other YouTubers making reaction videos couldn’t post videos with similar titles.
 
Wow. I don't even know how to react to this. Wait. Lets make a react video to this bit of news.
 
My thoughts.

First, I think copyrighting a single word should be outlawed. It's common English. It should be for statements "sayings" - originality - something associated with a brand that could possibly lead to confusion.

Second, are they a legal business with profit margins and tax paying? If not, no an individual can't own a copyright.
 
ShagnWagn said:
My thoughts.

First, I think copyrighting a single word should be outlawed. It's common English. It should be for statements "sayings" - originality - something associated with a brand that could possibly lead to confusion.

Second, are they a legal business with profit margins and tax paying? If not, no an individual can't own a copyright.
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Copyright and trademark are not the same thing and yes, an individual can own them. A corporation is a person in the eyes of the law.

Put simply, a trademark protects names/brands/catchphrases/etc. and copyright protects works (articles, books, photos).
 
For every action, there is an equal and opposite... action(tm).

Yes, I wanna trademark the word "action". :p
 
ShagnWagn said:
My thoughts.

First, I think copyrighting a single word should be outlawed. It's common English. It should be for statements "sayings" - originality - something associated with a brand that could possibly lead to confusion.

Second, are they a legal business with profit margins and tax paying? If not, no an individual can't own a copyright.
Click to expand...

trademark not copyright, and that isn't true of either. An individual can hold a trademark or a copyright. If I write a book I can copyright the book even though I am not a company.
 
In the grand scheme this probably won't do much for them. Some will hear of them for the first time and start watching their stuff, other might drop their subscription but still watch them time to time. People forget things too quickly so by next week nobody will remember this and it will be old news.
 
I meant trademark but typed copyright. Thanks for pointing that out. My bad.
 
They'll lose some in the short term but will gain them all back plus some more. I had no idea who these hipster dipshits were (seriously with the fucking beanie?) before all this, and I'm sure some people will watch the videos after they see the news and subscribe.

I think the bullshit hipster beanie pisses me off more than anything.
 
Damn with the beanie stuff. When I was a kid, we wore flannel and beanies. Then grunge happened. Then hipsters. They take all the stuff I had when I was a kid and overdo it... Now, I have nothing to wear when it's cold without being called a hipster... Fuckers.

They are getting more attention now than ever. They are known as the idiots, but I'm sure they are getting a lot of traffic (which generates revenue) because of it. People that don't know who they were are looking at their channel. Those that do are looking to see their reaction to it....

Fuck 'em. Just trying to fuck other people for a quick buck. I think there's a word for that. Yea: hooker.
 
Exavior said:
In the grand scheme this probably won't do much for them. Some will hear of them for the first time and start watching their stuff, other might drop their subscription but still watch them time to time. People forget things too quickly so by next week nobody will remember this and it will be old news.
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Well it's netted them about -200k subscribers so far, so... It did something so far.
 
Some people seriously over-reacted to this.

They said clearly they didn't own reaction videos nor were they trying to stop other people from making reaction videos or any thing, they just wanted people to be able to use their exact format and work like most other MCN's (Multi-channel-networks, IE Maker studios, Fullscreen, etc).

A Format is exactly how tv shows that do something others can do (IE Prank shows, comedy video shows, etc) can do it. Do you think if you made a show like Punk'd, using their exact style or graphics that you'd be a-ok? Cause you wouldn't, you'd find yourself in a lawsuit awfully fast if you copied it.

People like to jump to conclusions or just didn't have any idea what they were talking about and the quick knee-jerk reactions from other youtubers who made videos that they themselves didn't know really got people upset.
 
Stiler said:
Some people seriously over-reacted to this.

They said clearly they didn't own reaction videos nor were they trying to stop other people from making reaction videos or any thing, they just wanted people to be able to use their exact format and work like most other MCN's (Multi-channel-networks, IE Maker studios, Fullscreen, etc).

A Format is exactly how tv shows that do something others can do (IE Prank shows, comedy video shows, etc) can do it. Do you think if you made a show like Punk'd, using their exact style or graphics that you'd be a-ok? Cause you wouldn't, you'd find yourself in a lawsuit awfully fast if you copied it.

People like to jump to conclusions or just didn't have any idea what they were talking about and the quick knee-jerk reactions from other youtubers who made videos that they themselves didn't know really got people upset.
Click to expand...

Like the article states, they are copying for this format to start with.
 
Stiler said:
Some people seriously over-reacted to this.

They said clearly they didn't own reaction videos nor were they trying to stop other people from making reaction videos or any thing, they just wanted people to be able to use their exact format and work like most other MCN's (Multi-channel-networks, IE Maker studios, Fullscreen, etc).

A Format is exactly how tv shows that do something others can do (IE Prank shows, comedy video shows, etc) can do it. Do you think if you made a show like Punk'd, using their exact style or graphics that you'd be a-ok? Cause you wouldn't, you'd find yourself in a lawsuit awfully fast if you copied it.

People like to jump to conclusions or just didn't have any idea what they were talking about and the quick knee-jerk reactions from other youtubers who made videos that they themselves didn't know really got people upset.
Click to expand...

Say Donald Trump went on a rant about plumbers and a bunch of plumbers made a response video using the term, "Plumbers React". Which shows their realtime responses to Donald's rant. Sounds like they could be shut down. Even though the phase is more than reasonably be expected to be used commonly. If someone had never had seen a "kids react" or "elders react" video, they could still be expected to form that title on their own. That is what people are objecting to, the hijacking of common speak forcing people into awkward or unnatural alternate titles.
 
Stiler said:
Some people seriously over-reacted to this.

They said clearly they didn't own reaction videos nor were they trying to stop other people from making reaction videos or any thing, they just wanted people to be able to use their exact format and work like most other MCN's (Multi-channel-networks, IE Maker studios, Fullscreen, etc).

A Format is exactly how tv shows that do something others can do (IE Prank shows, comedy video shows, etc) can do it. Do you think if you made a show like Punk'd, using their exact style or graphics that you'd be a-ok? Cause you wouldn't, you'd find yourself in a lawsuit awfully fast if you copied it.

People like to jump to conclusions or just didn't have any idea what they were talking about and the quick knee-jerk reactions from other youtubers who made videos that they themselves didn't know really got people upset.
Click to expand...
What they say doesn't matter when they DO something. They have already done takedowns on other videos. Here's a more thorough explanation by an actual legal expert, it's the exact opposite of a knee jerk reaction:

https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/com...t_yell_about_the_react_trademark_lets/czh3w9f

Trying to pose this as someone stealing their exact format and graphics is disingenuous. Youtube already has tools in place to takedown someone stealing content from you without having to trademark the word "react." Plus, they've had takedowns of videos simply speaking negatively of them AND of ones that don't follow the format, but DO have "react" in the title. The anger over this partially comes from that, and partially because of the corporate doublespeak making it sound like this is some exciting new community, when the reality is they're handing out illegitimate copyright claims left and right as part of the process.

I honestly don't care about reaction videos myself since I think they're dumb, but what they're doing is just wrong. Trying to defend what they're doing shows you don't fully understand what's happening here.
 
I'm going to trademark the word 'The'...anytime someone uses the word, I get $1
 
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