BeerFiles is a sometimes irreverent blog concerning all things to do with IT, technology, people and the media from the point of view of a hard boiled technology journalist and commentator. Stan has been in the IT game for about a quarter of a century. He has seen and written about the rise and fall of more than a few IT players and made many friends, some of whom he has even crossed swords with on occasions. Everything in this blog is purely Stan’s opinion so if you agree, wish to expand upon, correct a post or tell Stan he’s a clueless know nothing, please feel free.

Apple says no podcasters please

by Stan Beer

Wednesday, 27 September 2006

Now that Apple believes that it has successfully sequestered the name "pod" from the English language, it is going hell for leather to try and shut anyone anything that uses pod in a name related to the music player business. Featured Whitepaper 5 Best Practices for Smartphone Support The latest target for Apple's protectionist zeal are service providers in the podcast business. In fact, as far as Apple is concerned, nobody has a right to use the word podcast in its name without Apple's permission. Pardon me for asking this, and please feel free to call me stupid, but hasn't the word podcast and the concept behind it done a lot to enhance the image and profile of Apple and its newest product in the marketplace? I mean, whenever the word podcast is mentioned don't we generally think of audio content that is meant to be downloaded to and played on an iPod? Does this not mean that everytime someone uses the term podcast, that by association Apple's iPod gets some free publicity and mindshare? Apple may choose to think of it as brand dilution but in reality it's brand reinforcement. The term podacst passed into the English language of its own accord, just like webcast or the verb Google, which reinforces the noun which is the company. This brand dilution obsession is a furfy and an abuse of trademark laws, which were designed to protect companies with products like iPod from companies that try to set themsefves with competing products sporting names like ePod and so on. So when companies with names like MyPodder and Podcast ready get nasty threatening letters, Apple isn't just being a bully but it's actually doing itself a disservice. Now I have some other work to do so I think I'll do some research and Google a few names.{moscomment} Tags See All Tags Apple  iPod  Powered By Joomla Tags Please enable JavaScript in your browser to post your comment!

 

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