06/03/2008

Netvibes wants me to change my Universe name. Why ? It's a "generic term"

Remember my post about the war of Domain names in Netvibes Universes ?

I was surprised that you could choose almost any universe name you wanted.

So, I decided to try myself. I created a few Universes. One of those is:

http://www.netvibes.com/travel Not big deal, but I founded strange that Netvibes had not protect it ;).

Anyway, Netvibes has decided to act and here the email I just received today with the injunction to change my Universe name :

Dear Ginger private beta tester,

We would like to thank you for your participation in our beta
program and for the huge interest you had in creating your public
page but it has come to our attention that the name you selected
for your Netvibes universe (which appears on the URL of your
universe) may be in violation of our Terms of Service either
because this name is a generic term or because it might
potentially infringe upon the rights of third parties.

We'll soon provide new features which will make it easier for you
to share interests but in the meantime we kindly demand that you
modify this name in your profile http://www.netvibes.com/#view-profile
as soon as possible, but no later than in the next 7 days, or that
you provide us with evidence that you possess the necessary rights
to such name. If not, we would be forced to have it modified or to
suspend your account.

Thank you for your cooperation and we hope you enjoy Ginger. If
you think this email has been sent by mistake please contact
our support.
http://www.netvibes.com/static.php?show=feedback

Best Regards,

The Netvibes Team
http://www.netvibes.com/

Of course I will change it, but I wonder if Netvibes will send similar emails to the following existing Universe:

http://www.netvibes.com/news
http://www2.netvibes.com/web
http://www2.netvibes.com/sex
http://www2.netvibes.com/sexe
http://www.netvibes.com/games
http://www2.netvibes.com/auto
http://www2.netvibes.com/tech
http://www2.netvibes.com/music
http://www2.netvibes.com/photo
http://www2.netvibes.com/photos
http://www.netvibes.com/film
http://www.netvibes.com/foot

http://www.netvibes.com/france
http://www.netvibes.com/uk
http://www.netvibes.com/italy

http://www.netvibes.com/tomtom
http://www.netvibes.com/hp

I am surprised that Netvibes reacts afterwards, it could have been simpler to prevent users to choose the terms that Netvibes had reserved from a list...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I got the same email for my EU-universe (www.netvibes.com/eu)probably "because it might
potentially infringe upon the rights of third parties." I really think they should have thought about this issue earlier... I also wonder whether they send these emails based on a complaint by third parties?

JAC said...

Hi Kosmopolit,
I do not think that they had received complaints but they prefer to "cover themselves" in case ...

Anyway, could you send me you new Universe name when you change it ?

You can write it on my Universe:
http://www.netvibes.com/netviberexperience#Best_UNIVERSES_by_NetEx

You have ideas for that ? myeu, my_eu ? eu-infos ? ;)