Facebook swipes user's vanity URL Facebook's recently introduced vanity URLs may be a handy function for many, but the offer to distinguish users' profiles with names rather than numbers is not unconditional. Defence systems engineer David Lloyd was pleased to be able to adopt the nickname 'squaresheep' to distinguish his Facebook profile from those of the …
Why did facebook assume that it was his vanity name and not what was in the details which was wrong? - he could have been born David LLoyd but changed to Square Sheep by deedpoll.
I don't remember facebook making it clear that the vanity name had to be based on the name you enter in your profile.
Big brother as BB=Big Business=Big Gov't=Be evil to the little guy
I guess he could register 'http://www.squaresheep.co.uk/' - oops, no he can't that seems to have been taken already, though it's not being used.
I don't use facebook anymore since it's pretty much a complete waste of time, but this sort of autocratic behaviour needs to be challenged.
I wonder if our David could challenge the gym people for using his name? how long have they been around?
hmm 'was formed on the 1st January 2008 following the acquisition of David Lloyd Leisure Ltd' from their website, so our David might have a good basis for that.
ttfn
I think David is unfortunately mistaking Facebook for a user-focussed website. It's clients aren't users, but businesses. Users are merely eyes for adverts.
After all, how much is David going to directly pay Facebook in revenue? Keeping a business happy is a much more productive act for them than keeping a user happy.
I think this shows that Facebook only cares about monetizing your content, rather than expressing your individuality. That's why I won't let them have my photos, or any sensitive personal info.
From FB's own blog page:
"Starting at 12:01 a.m. EDT on Saturday, June 13, you'll be able to choose a username on a first-come, first-serve basis for your profile and the Facebook Pages that you administer by visiting www.facebook.com/username/. "
Put simply, he got there first, and registered the name. Quite how some random cookery site (yeah, like the internet needs another one of those !) can pull rank because they were too slow to register, I don't know. They don't even appear to be commercial, and the whois for the domain is "cloaked" - never a good sign.
The site has never been spidered by the Wayback Machine, and Netcraft says they first saw that domain in Feb 2004, so it's not like it's a catchy new name or trademark that needs to protected.
Maybe squaresheep.com needs a recipe for humble pie ?
Facebook is probably wrong on their own rules and moreover clearly focusing on the wrong thing, but all that is besides the point:
Why would one use facebook in the first place?
If you (as is clearly the case) have to have a domain name with your vanity name on it to have any claim on a vanity -facebook- name, then there is no point in having a facebook profile any longer. Ye olde html links work just as well to link to the blogs of your friends and anyone can link to you if they'd like to. What extra special secret sauce does facebook offer that I am missing?
Tough luck! Do we have to pander to cry-babies like this now?
Lots of people have the same nickname, don't see them crying about it! Get a life!
I have a .com domain for my nickname, but still find my nickname has been used by others on some sites I visit. I don't go demanding recompense for the outrage. I simply lump it!
All I can say is 'lol' - It's Facebook after all, they are a law into themselves and there is never a way of putting your side of the story to them, or appealing one of their administrative 'decisions'.
I deleted my account a long time ago and everyone else should do the same. It's a crap, pointless, advertising laden site anyway. Who cares.
God, amen! I stopped using "social networking" after i tinkered around with myspace for a bit. I thought to myself how horrible it would be if details I didn't want people knowing about my life were out there for all to see. Now years later celebrities routinely embarrass themselves via twitter, facebook, etc. I think the irony of these websites is they drive away what would be their heaviest users with their Jobsian style ecosystem. Even if we're not paying we're still the consumer. Why would you put up with this shit? Just don't use the service. Oh wait, I'm not relevant in the social networking society! OH NOES! Social networking just confirmed the long held belief that most people are idiots.
Facebook are obliged by their shareholders to minimise costs and maximise revenue. That means they will almost never have time to act fairly - all they will do in this kind of situation is take the path that seems likely to be least expensive at the time, in other words take action in favour of the side to any dispute that seems most likely to threaten a more costly (to Facebook) lawsuit.
What those who don't like this fact need isn't yet another web 2.0 single monopoly site whose users attention or content is sold to advertisers. Much better will be a social networking protocol for which anyone can implement and operate a client or server with some means selectively and optionally to share content between users and servers where prior knowledge and trust relationships exist. That is why so called web 2.0 is a regression - it's really web 0.5.
This is how judges in USA court system make on many cases in the US court systems.
It all boils down to money and the way the USA courts act like money can buy your way into heaven too.
Greed wins everytime. Go ask the 2 guys who invented the priceless pics series and mastercard stole the idea from them and prevented them in court from using their own idea.
The 2 guys invented it thus it is THEIR PRIOR ART. IP theft like this needs to be stopped!
But the company squaresheep.com need to do exactly what the SCI-FI channel did and do a
name change for the very same reason as SQUARESHEEP is WAYYYY to a generic term and not unique at all among the people that do use it.
It shows a lack of class and ingenuity and witt that a companies advertising dept could not come up with a better name.
Whilst I agree that this shouldn't have been taken from him, saying that it helped people finding him is not a valid argument.
Facebook already has a 'nick name' field which can be searched on, and indeed, he's using it, because if you search for David Lloyd squaresheep, he's the only match that comes up
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