babyblueblanket said:
A company by a legal rights does not have to respond. I was merely implying that irregardless of emails being sent back and forth (or lack of) the first thought is, I'm going to sue. We are in a very niche level of marketing and business. I get and understand practicing the art of not wanting your trophy taken away but that said. If you have a better product then it will do the speaking for itself. I won't take any low jabs at how each company conducts their business. Casey has done an amazing job with the cards that were dealt to him and his company is/has experienced what I call "First class problems". (Those are good problems to have)
I'ts simply my opinion that there can be other competitors in a market as small as our that have similarities when it comes to a simple definition of an area such as "space".
I equally applaud Tod for growing his business into a realm where no one else has gone. Personally, I thought Snuggies was a great name for an AB product. The product it's self did not have a representation to the Kimberly-Clark product huggies but through the course of cease and desist and threat of lawsuit (from a company who has very powerful lawyers on stand-by), you're better off admitting defeat and coming up with something else.
I'm sorry to offend the lovers, but I stand with Tykables on this one.
And i'll repeat. It's such a small world for us, don't compromise it, become better than it and let your product stand out.
The thing is from a legal perspective, there can't be other competitors in the market with "Space" in it, it's part of copyright law, that unless you defend it, you're considered to have lost it. Not to mention that we in the community say we "bought some space diapers" all the time when we purchase from ABU, allowing someone else to use the name necessarily means they're stepping on their toes, so to speak.
Further, ABU's trademark does not concern the imagery, ideas, designs, etc., it literally just concerns the name. As such, ABU made every effort to work with Tykables on this, and Tykables did not bother to respond. At that point, I can't see how ABU can be seen as vindictive or selfish at all here, they don't have a choice but to defend the trademark, and did their best to avoid having to do so.
And at first I was squarely on Tykables side, the idea that one can have a trademark on the concept of space, or that one could even consider suing because someone else used space in their product just seemed completely absurd to me. I even used the exact phrase, "Embarassing and stupid. Stop this." in my comments on it over on Reddit. But once I got filled in on the details of the claim and what exactly transpired here, I can't see how Tykables has any leg to stand on here. "Space Diaper" is ABU's specific trademark, they aren't interested in any other aspect, and they legitimately have a copyright upon it, at that point, anybody else naming their diaper a "Space Diaper", is infringing on this copyright by default. Cut and dry really, and as far as PR and being a good steward of the community, ABU did everything they could to avoid it coming to this, and were spurned unceremoniously. At this point, what are we even standing with Tykables on? Their right to infringe on someone else's trademark? Because that's the only thing that they're standing on at present.
As an aside, the "Snuggies" name was not gotten rid of because it sounded too close to "Huggies", it's because there's literally another product by the name of Snuggies.
https://snuggiestore.com/
Now, I have no idea if the people behind Tykables were even aware that product existed before making their diapers, so no harm no foul for having to change it there. But they were definitively aware of ABU Space Diapers, and ABU's trademark on that name, and were amply warned, and offered opportunities to work with them on it. And they simply refused. In principle, I agree, there is plenty of room for two or more space themed diapers on the market, and for what it's worth, Casey completely agreed, in
that Reddit thread, he said so personally. But the company must legally defend their copyright on the name "Space Diaper", and that's what this lawsuit is about.
