But -- wow -- how to keep up with all the new media? And, umm, I now have a day job. As technology and cool social media sites have proliferated, I've done my best to keep abreast of all the sites for communicating my message.
This blog of course, has a Facebook page, and if you haven't yet liked it, I encourage your participation.
I am also on Tumblr (for which I have a kind of visceral aesthetic love), and Twitter, which I attend to in fits and starts.
I am even on etsy and ebay, should I ever find the time to sell some of my French trouvailles. Working on it!But when I joined Pinterest, I was irked, annoyed, upset to see that someone had taken my name, "Polly-Vous Francais," to use for one of her Pinterest pages. Awkwardly, I do also have my own, authentic, Polly-Vous Francais Pinterest account.
Why would anyone want to siphon credit, SEO, and Google page hits from my personal blog, which has spent six years delivering knowledgeable fun and news about Americans and their relationship with France? Especially since this other person who copied my copyrighted nom de plume is not named Polly in real life and has never even lived in France? Polly-Vous Francais is my personal brand, built with pride and quality and a true raison d'etre.
I've left a few comments on her page, asking for a name change. A few loyal fans have done the same. No response. Naturally, I'm not encouraging readers to flock to her page because that will only increase her page hits. Arrgh! But I wish that common courtesy still existed in the cyberworld.
What do you think? Next steps?
12 comments:
Great post. I just located your blog and wished to let you know that I have certainly loved reading your blogs. At any rate I’m going to be subscribing to your feed and I really hope you are writing again soon.
If Polly-Vous Français is copyrighted, can't you get all legal on her? I am sure you don't want to engage a lawyer, but maybe you have a lawyerly friend who could advise you?
Also, people are jerks.
A cease and desist letter from a lawyer might do the trick.
Playing Devil's Advocate here, but do you think she meant it to really take the name for hits? Maybe she thought it clever initially. Now that you've contacted her, she's being stubborn and a tad rude, but I've seen plenty of Pinterest boards with the same name. I doubt it was anything maliciously personal.
Have you contacted Pinterest to let them know that someone is using your copyrighted name?
Present Pinterest with the evidence and they may contact her themselves.
I'd start there before going the litigious route.
Yeah my first reaction was also to get legal on her butt. But Ken is right, Pinterest should intervene on your behalf.
THEN I would fake a letter to cease and desist.
"Accounts with usernames, Pin Board names, or any other content that misleads others or violates another’s trademark may be updated, transferred or permanently suspended."
Thanks for all the ideas.
Zoe, you are right in that there are a lot of Pinterest boards with the same name, but zair ees onlee one Polly-Vous Francais in zee world. :)Well, you know what I mean. I created it and claimed it ages ago. For example, if someone wanted to call their Pinterest page "Patricia Wells" and posted all about French cooking without actually being Patricia Wells or posting about her recipes or classes, I think Patricia would be upset. Right?
I already contacted Pinterest about a month ago but I think it went into their "customer service" nether-file. So I just sent them a link to this blog post. Maybe that will prompt at least a courtesy email back. Merci buckets to all!
p.s. in my email to Pinterest, I said that it feels like identity theft.
The most you can do is tell the readers of your blog not to go there.
Decency is lacking on the web
I am not surprised, Polly...
Besides lacking decency like isolation bordeaux says it is so trashy...
Maria
After reading this article yesterday, I was dismayed to find someone using your identity to send me an ad for other products. There were three other addressees on this spam. I marked it as spam and dumper, but I wonder how many other of your subscribers got spam hiding behind "Polly-vous Francais?
Richard,
Alas, my Polly-Vous Francais email account got hacked. Mes apologies! I don't know how it happened, since I never click on unknown links. In any case, I changed my password. And I guess I'll need to change it frequently. O internet!
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