How I Got Fired From the Job I Invented
"Travel blogger Turner Barr discovered that his entire brand, image, and web personality has been hijacked by a multi-billion dollar company for use in a marketing campaign. 'The video for their marketing campaign was particularly creepy for me, as even my age and personality didn’t escape the level of detail spent on creating this doppelganger (they used a paid actor of course). ... I’m no longer even the first thing that comes up when you Google my brand name. I’ve turned down work opportunities and put on hold any future travel job plans to deal with lawyers, long distance phone calls, corporate executives and other such nonsense — all along feeling misled and patronized. This situation has been extremely confusing for not only myself, but also for participants in company’s marketing campaign who message me thinking that I am am part of the company.'"
Sucks, but Barr is in this mess because he never formally registered a trademark.
Tough lesson learned.
Trademark protection depends on use in commerce, not registration. Both registered and non-registered trademarks are both eligible for protection under the Lanham Act.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_...k_registration
Right but I'm not saying he's not protected.
I'm saying he could have saved himself time, trouble and money had he registered it to begin with.
Addeco still has a pending application for the trademark of this idea:
http://tsdr.uspto.gov/do entviewer...20130412072030
Well, apparently they admitted they ed up and renamed the contest... good news all around
Update: June 26, 2013. Adecco's 80 Jobs Around the World Contest has been renamed the Job Experience contest. The winners have been notified and will participate in a unique job experience this summer.
From Adecco's Way to Work Facebook Page:
We have spoken with Turner and have come to an agreement about how we can make it right with him. Sometimes corporations can make mistakes. We are sorry, Turner.
We will also deliver on our promise to the youngsters who won and deserve a unique job experience. We will make sure that every winner experiences the possibilities and opportunities the world of work brings.
We've learned a lot in the past few weeks. We will work to make this right. We will do this because we are a company of great people who sometimes make mistakes, learn from them and do better next time.
Your Adecco Way to Work Team
http://jobsearch.about.com/b/2013/06...bs-contest.htm
at this being a "mistake."
apparently they backed down once it started to make the rounds in social media... you could actually go to their site and they have a facebook and twitter feed, and the story there was how they ripped the guy off
Yeah, hard to believe that they would have apologized like this had they not been getting blasted all over the social media world.
But that seems to be the mantra of big business these days: take from the little guy now and apologize later if he fights it
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