This site is just tried to fake a chrome update for me. Serving up malware.<p>Viewing source their wordpress for sure has been hacked.<p>Obfuscated JS at the bottom of every static js file. Must be something random that it targeted me. cant seam to make it trigger again.
Back in the day I worked at MetaCreations née MetaTools[0]. We had a web browser plugin that rendered streaming, progressive, interactive 3D - well before WebGL et. al. It shipped with IE and was available for other browsers as well. The MetaStream logo[1][2][3] was surprisingly similar to the Meta one.<p>[0] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MetaCreations" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MetaCreations</a><p>[1] It was surprisingly hard to find a copy of the logo on image search.<p>[2] <a href="https://browserengine.net/wp-content/uploads/metastream3plugin4.png" rel="nofollow">https://browserengine.net/wp-content/uploads/metastream3plug...</a><p>[3] <a href="https://twitter.com/Salliemeta/status/1454571901381058562/photo/1" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/Salliemeta/status/1454571901381058562/ph...</a><p>Nothing new under the sun...
While I am not a fan of Facebook/Meta, I actually hope that they do not lose this case. If you want to name your company after a word that is in common usage, then you should have to deal with the fact that others may use the same word for their own purposes. JP Morgan seems like a name that hardly limits anyone trying to name their company. Apple or Meta are just words in common usage.
I also occassionally mourn the death of the word Meta, It was such a beautiful and succinct word.<p><pre><code> Meta means about the thing itself. It's seeing the thing from a higher perspective instead of from within the thing, like being self-aware.
</code></pre>
Not to forget the words like Metadata, Meta-physics, Meta-analysis, Metameme.<p>Long live Meta[adjective].
Interesting. Given they've dealt in the VR space before, and registered the trademark, this would seem to be a compelling case. I wish them the best.
Reminds me of eToys vs eToy in the late 90s. Hacking groups targeted eToys and caused many late nights for the ops team. I joined eToys shortly after as a Perl dev and decided to nmap scan ToysRUs and eToys cybersecurity team was on a hair trigger after the eToy hacks. Someone literally came thumping down the hallway and walked straight into my office. I put my hands up and started apologizing profusely and they let it slide.<p><a href="https://www.artforum.com/print/200003/etoys-vs-etoy-278" rel="nofollow">https://www.artforum.com/print/200003/etoys-vs-etoy-278</a>
I published a NFT app named "Meta" weeks before Facebook was changed to Meta.<p><a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ai.art.nft.creator.generator" rel="nofollow">https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ai.art.nft...</a>
> The name Meta is primarily a female name of German origin that means Pearl.<p><a href="https://babynames.com/name/meta" rel="nofollow">https://babynames.com/name/meta</a>
Ah yeah - I've been bummed that people now think <a href="https://metacademy.org/" rel="nofollow">https://metacademy.org/</a> is about meta.
The term “metaverse” was first used in Neil Stevenson's 1982 novel Snow Crash. IANAL but it seems dubious to me that anyone besides Neil gets to claim dibs on the word "meta" as used in the context of VR.
There's loads of companies out there with extremely similar names. It's hard to come up with something totally unique. I believe, legally, it just can't be identical to a name already registered in the same state. When I was trying to name my own business, it was amazing to see how many names were already taken just in my state. Not that it makes it right for Meta/Facebook to do whatever they want but any rebranding they chose would probably have stepped on someone's toes.