Nice one Specialized!

wonderturtle said:
dont disagree with this.

plus you throw in the fact that "Roubaix" is the name of a city/ region in France (not some specific unique model name Specialized just came up with) and a term that is commonly known in the cycling community (way "above and beyond" any particular bike model or bike shop). makes the protection of the term "Roubaix" seem a bit of a stretch.

e.g., can "Manhattan Bagels" own the word "Manhattan". and if so, can they sue another business if they dare use the word "Manhattan"? unless they bascially steal their business model, decor, sell coffee, etc. and simply call themselves "Manhattan Donuts", the use of the word "Manhattan" should not necessarily be protected.

granted with this "Roubaix" situation, they are generally in the same business, so..... again, not so clear cut.

but as I said above, no system is perfect. but doing away with the system (which again is a critical component of an open capitalist society) altogether is certainly not the answer.

is Specialized going a little overboard here?...maybe.

but are they basically forced to do so due to the way the laws are written? ...does anyone here know the laws well enough to even comment intelligently? I dont.
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Like so many other of life's greatest ills, this is a Canadian problem. In the US, this wouldn't have happened precisely because a location name cannot be trademarked. I just read a really good article on this here. (It's "good" because he agree with everything I believe.)



Monkey Soup said:
Let me simplify this so you understand. All of the risk in drug development is taken by the innovator, the generics take very little of it. Drugs are expensive to make. A typical end-to-end (discovery through registration) program can cost around $500M, and most of the majors have at least 10-15 major programs in play at once, with only 1-2 every making it through registration. You can put the evil pharma companies out of business, but then we can also go back to dying of sore throats and infected cuts.
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This is the truth. Lots of companies aren't even willing to take the development costs on anymore. They license products developed by small biotechs (or buy them outright) -- in fact, that's the "home run" scenario for those small biotechs and it's why there is a huge VC industry surrounding biotech. It's a big risk to take, but the smaller companies are more nimble, with one drug in development with a sole endgame of getting approval and licensing the technology or selling it outright. However when it doesn't work out, which so often happens, the small company is obliterated. There are whole departments in some big pharma companies dedicated to monitoring the progress in these biotechs and deciding which are worth investing in.
 
JMartz said:
It's time to abolish patents and trademarks. Let the best product win. Prices will drop, people will be happy. Look at drug companies. Generics are half the price but until generics come out people die because they can't afford the drugs. The whole thing is a disgrace.

Oh and I was looking at buying a used Camber, but probably wont now.
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Great prescription for destroying innovation and jobs in the U.S.
 
1speed said:
Like so many other of life's greatest ills, this is a Canadian problem. In the US, this wouldn't have happened precisely because a location name cannot be trademarked.
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Not true! There are thousands of US trademarks that use the names of cities, states, geographical features, etc. I think you misunderstood the statement in the article. Specialized couldn't trademark "Roubaix" in the US because it was already taken by Fuji Bicycles. Allegedly, they reached some kind of settlement from Fuji to use the name.

You can search the USPTO website for free without registering: http://www.uspto.gov/
 
SmooveP said:
Not true! There are thousands of US trademarks that use the names of cities, states, geographical features, etc. I think you misunderstood the statement in the article. Specialized couldn't trademark "Roubaix" in the US because it was already taken by Fuji Bicycles. Allegedly, they reached some kind of settlement from Fuji to use the name.

You can search the USPTO website for free without registering: http://www.uspto.gov/
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Okay! I wasn't aware of that. I stand corrected.

Thanks a lot for ruining my chance to bag on Canadia, though.
 
the backfire

Wondering if all this negative hype can be blamed on the trademark infringement (if there is one?)

Hence real damages where none would have existed?

just going through the iterations...
 
I bought a T-shirt and retro Jersey from the shop last night. I always root for the underdog.
 
Lest we forget:

picture.php


(with apologies to everyone is legitimately special ed.)
 
jShort said:
Yes.. Fuji is really coming out smelling like roses here. I don't buy it.
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That's a good point. I'm pretty sure the pilot of one of the WTC airplanes was Salvadore Fuji. It's all starting to make sense now...
 
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