Hugely clueless couple attempts to trademark "Occupy Wall Street" for merchandising
By Virginia SmithOctober 25th, 2011, 3:45 pmComments (22)
Seemingly unaware of the entire point of Occupy Wall Street, one Long Island couple has put in a bid to trademark the term "Occupy Wall Street" for use on t-shirts, bumper stickers, etc. "I'm no marketing genius, but when you've got something that's across fifty states, it's a brand now," said Robert Marcesa, who put in the initial request to the U.S. Patent and Trademark office with his wife, Diane.
Needless to say the protestors actually occupying Wall Street are skeptical about the idea, and one spokesman said, "The goal of OWS is not to become a profitable business [...] We already make T-shirts down there for free, screen-printing on site. We think that organic individual marketing — making our own buttons or T-shirts — is more valuable."
Well, that's a pretty predictable response. Marcesa, however, maintains that his motives are pure, saying, "I'm the best person they could imagine buying the slogan, because no one has their interest more than myself. This is an important slogan; somebody else might have gotten a hold of it."
Marcesa also added that he'd hypothetically be willing to sell the trademark back to Occupy Wall Street once the "brand" is underway for as little as $1, minus expenses. Sounds fair, but what's with all this sudden talk of "branding" for an anti-corporate, grassroots movement like OWS? Maybe Kanye West's visit to Zuchotti Park had more of an impact on the protestors than we realized.
Commentarium (22 Comments)
Sooner or later, someone at OWS is going to figure out that OWS has expenses, and that one way to cover them is to sell merchandise. If this movement has long-term viability, they should be able to find the grey area between being a non-profit group that covers its expenses and being a greedy corporation.
excellent point you have there
Clueless is more apt to be used to describe the OWS douchebags. I love how they say they represent the 99%. But what happened when the homeless, the rock-bottom of the 99, showed up? That's right, the protesters started bitching about how the homeless were just jumping on the bandwagon and that they hadn't done anything to merit taking the free food, clothing and supplies provided to the protesters who were there on behalf of people just like the homeless. Now that's rich. Looks like these filthy hippies have no sense of irony. Go home and bathe, you bunch of fucking losers.
For the record, we are now deleting any comment that pertains to Trolling. Comma's input, while perhaps unpalatable to some of us, directly pertains to the article. Should you feel the need to disagree with him, please do so, but spamming back with "trolling" doesn't add anything to the article.
Who are you talking about? Are you talking about people who represent OWS or some douchebag someone got on record saying something stupid? The halves have been very quick to make sure they find someone who looks like a hippie, or smells, or whatever to claim represents an incredibly large and surpringly organized movement that has the majority of the country at heart. Grow up and read of book.
I suppose it's easier to come up with a sign in policy so that a racist homophobe can't pollute your comments with his bullshit on a daily basis?
Majority of the country at heart? That's exactly what the Tea Party says and it isn't true. Just because most of America is fed up with the banks and gov't, that doesn't mean that they represent the majority of Americans. What I stated in my comment was reported in the news (no, not FOX).This movement isn't organized at all. A bunch of people ain the same place at the same time all with different agendas isn't organization. All that is happening is a block party by people who are pissed about being broke but not pissed enough to shut off their cable tv or their $100/month data plans on their $200 iPhones or iPads. And, yes, they do look like hippies. @Well...- How would signing in stop a person from saying something that you disagree with. If you don't want somebody hijacking your initials, then subscribe to Hooksexup.
"Just because most of America is fed up with the banks and gov't, that doesn't mean that they represent the majority of Americans."
This makes no sense. Being fed up with the banks and government is PRECISELY what this movement is about. How anyone cannot understand this at this point is baffling.
"What I stated in my comment was reported in the news (no, not FOX)"
Nobody said it was.
"This movement isn't organized at all."
Their deft handling of social media suggests otherwise, not to mention the worldwide protests of the 15th. Now if by 'organized' you mean a list of nonsensical bullet points that those with short attention spans can manage, then yeah, it isn't organized.
"shut off their cable tv or their $100/month data plans on their $200 iPhones or iPads"
And you know this is true because?
"And, yes, they do look like hippies."
I don't see what purpose this comment serves. What does it matter? So what if they look like hippies? Why is this relevant? Who cares? I mean, besides the people who want to
"How would signing in stop a person from saying something that you disagree with. If you don't want somebody hijacking your initials, then subscribe to Hooksexup."
It's colossally naive to think that Hooksexup's 'posting without login' system doesn't encourage rampant trolling; obviously a sign-in system wouldn't 'stop' anybody who waved bye-bye to dignity long ago, or someone paid specifically to troll these kinds of sites (or the person who is both of these things, which I find the former almost always results in the latter), though sign-in systems do allow some easier tracking of user profiles and at leasts stems some of the idiocy. Your incendiary rhetoric seems to point to the fact that you really aren't interested in having a civil discussion, but are more interested in injecting your poisonous and hateful worldview onto others who would rather participate in the former.
Scott, I was going to reply on that last point, but you made it much better than I would have. +1 to you, sir.
I don't care about signing in as it pertains to censoring dissenting voices; but it certainly would prevent the name-stealing bullshit that went down between AT and Pub, and jr and Riiight.
what name stealing? :)
Dear Scott. Most of America thinks that OWS is full of shit. The hippie look goes to credibility. I'll bet money that almost ALL of the protesters have iPads, phones, and Mac books.viral videos on you tube or twitter feeds isn't organization. If it were, then Star Wars Kid would be the sentimental leader of this music-less Woodstock. My comment about the news was in response to @period. As for your final paragraph? Blah blah blah. You just can't stand anybody calling bullshit bullshit. Hell, who can? ;-). But to really expect everyone to just buy into their line of thinking is ridiculous. I don't, neither should you. @Well...- Scott's last paragraph applies to you as much as anyone else.
Forget it. I don't think that they will make a difference but I hope that they do.
So where does the real comma stand? Having second thoughts?
I apply to comma, not anyone else! Scott was talking to you and you alone. ";-)."
Sounds like they are savvy people who know how to game the system to get things done. OWS could learn something from this.
"I don't see what purpose this comment serves. What does it matter? So what if they look like hippies? Why is this relevant? Who cares? I mean, besides the people who want to"
*denigrate the 'others' on completely irrelevant criteria...
One thing Hooksexup could use is a fucking edit feature. Join the 21st century of blogging, guys. Holy shitballs.
"Your incendiary rhetoric seems to point to the fact that you really aren't interested in having a civil discussion, but are more interested in injecting your poisonous and hateful worldview onto others who would rather participate in the former."
LOL
That's tantamount to "spamming back with 'trolling'"!!
Has anyone actually watched and listened to any of the interviews with the "occupiers"? I mean, come one, these people aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer. In fact, in all honesty, I'm embarrassed for most of them. They seem to have no clue as to what they are protesting.. other than, something relating to... the rich are bad.. because they are rich.. the rich aren't paying taxes... and us 99%-ers deserve their money.
Check that off the list of things I was conufsed about.
Y3JyWR yedkkrdkowml
Now you say something