not so bad?

I was watching an interesting podcast (http://revision3.com/diggnation) related to trademarks. Sometimes you just hate the larger companies (think LucasFilm, though they're a poor example since they've supported fan films before) stomping all over the kid that makes a fan film in his basement.

Turns out, though, I have a new appreciation for the need to do so. If you don't aggressively protect your trademark and allow it to be come co-opted by another party, you can lose the rights to the trademark.

Case in point, someone had created some tools for digg and used "digg" in the product name. By doing so, even though digg may not have cared, had no choice but to send out a cease-and-desist in order to protect its rights. I may hate lawyers and the legal system in general (despite designing software for a claims administration company) but it makes me wonder how many other seemingly unfair practices occur in the business world that are easily justified from someone's perspective. It *almost* makes me feel bad for the RIAA . . . *almost*

Anyways, this thought process made me think about my lack of online presence. Some "pizza slut" (hey, she used it to describe herself) stole my "swingsetacid" name and used it on myspace. now, hey, it came from a GYBE! song title, so i can't claim ownership. and our above mentioned friend does list GYBE! as a musical interest. still, it's not like googling "swingsetacid" will bring up anything but something related to me. so, i figure, i should probably continue to post some interesting things as i have time.