MMarcoe wrote:

> Mark Zuckerberg wants to own "face," "book," and maybe even "like." Should we let him?

Of course we should - after all, once Warner Brothers came along (or maybe it was the Marx Brothers), we stopped letting anyone else refer to themselves as 'brothers' ...  And no other characters in any medium can be called 'Mickey' or a 'mouse' after Mickey Mouse came along.  That way every new character or reference impoverishes the English language, forever removing any other references that use that word.

I'll start by referring to this idea as 'meretricious'.  Unfortunately that's one word used up forever, but I think this idea deserves it.  :)

Oct 27, 2010 -- 4:18PM, MMarcoe wrote:

Mark Zuckerberg wants to own "face," "book," and maybe even "like." Should we let him?

www.computerworld.com/s/article/9192700/...

www.infoworld.com/d/adventures-in-it/fac...

FACE PALM!!!

But NO, he doesn't own any words whatsoever and shouldn't.

Just WHO does he think he is???

He only gets to own the copyright of "Facebook" itself.

MMarcoe wrote:

> What about the Everly Brothers?  And Mighty Mouse?

Clearly copyright violations whose creators should have been jailed ... right?  :)

And if Mighty Mouse had been a valid copyright, then the Mighty Ducks were an illegal use of the word 'mighty'.

I think we should jail Mark Zuckerberg's parents for copyright violation too - after all, he's hardly the first 'Mark' in the world, and probably not the first 'Zuckerberg'.  If they didn't acquire exclusive use to the rights of both names, they had no right to name him that.  Hmmmph, the nerve!

(Er, just in case, for the humor-impaired ... there is a good deal of sarcasm in the above.  I know MMarcoe is going to get it, but there may be others out there who might think I'm serious.)

This is the tip of the iceberg.

Do you know that you might not even own the genes in your own body?

www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/04/01/60min...

"But the good news is that since the mapping of the human genome, science has made some giant leaps in detecting and treating inherited conditions.

By detecting those genes, for example the genes that predispose women to breast cancer, doctors can offer preemptive treatment. It sounds simple enough, but there's a catch: a woman may have that gene, but strange as it seems, it's really the property of a biotech company that has taken out a patent on it. "

So, does that mean I can own the "F" word?