Let me start off by saying that, as most folks already know, Tim and John and I are not BFF--we've had our own little run ins over the years. Second, sending lawyers to attack a non-profit is just straight-up dumb. Especially when you've made tens of millions of dollars being the proponent of the open source and Web 2.0 memes like Tim has.

However, Tim clearly has some rights to the Web 2.0 mark in the *title* of a conference name. Battelle points this out, and that it makes business sense to defend your brand.

Regardless of who made up the Web 2.0 term (Tim didn't invent--I heard people say Web 2.0 back in 98.. it was one of the terms that was just out there for a long time), it's pretty well established that Tim made the Web 2.0 term *stick* and he certainly was the first to do an event based on the Web 2.0 name.

If someone comes along and does a "Web 2.0" event that is dilutive of the brand that Tim and John have built (i.e. confusing to users) that's is just not fair. Now, I'm not saying that in *this* case folks wouldn't know the difference, but we all know that our legal systems is designed so that you have defend yourself consistently if you want protection. Every time you let something slide the evil folks can use that as ammunition for you to lose your rights. Our trademark system isn't perfect--we all know that. Of course, a call to the IT@Cork folks would have solved the problem I think (and so does JBAT).

Now, if someone uses Web 2.0 in the tag line, or is really, really clear that it's not an O'Reilly event with the naming of the event, then I think that's fine. For example, if someone does the Web 2.0 Summit or The Web 2.0 Expo I think that's OK. However, if they just do a "Web 2.0" conference that's not cool because some folks might actually think it is Tim or John's event.

When I was running Silicon Alley Reporter we had a similar issue. We had the double edge sword of having a buzzword in our brand name: Silicon Alley. Every time Silicon Alley was mentioned in the news or in a magazine got a bump in brand recognition. However, other folks would make Silicon Alley branded magazines and take a little of our thunder. We had conferences in addition to our magazine that used the format Silicon Alley YEARNAME (i.e. Silicon Alley 97, 98, 99, 2000, etc), and we had to defend those because some folks would come along and say "we're doing a 'Silicon Alley' conference too!" Our position was just don't call it Silicon Alley YEARNAME. Call it the Silicon Alley SOMETHING. People did, everyone got on with their life.

Tim *doesn't* seem to want it both ways. He understands he doesn't own the name. He just had some bonehead lawyer do what bonehead lawyers do--write bonehead letters. I wish lawyers would start thinking like humans, and I'm sure Tim would too. It's Tim's job to set the tone with his legal folks, and he's dropped the ball on this one. I'm sure he's fixed it and it won't happen again.

We all know Tim's a brilliant guy (and so is John), and they put on a good show--I'm gonna give him the benefit of the doubt here.

At the end of the day, if people want to leave this Web 2.0 meme behind they should just start a Web 3.0 Conference... no one's trademarked that already right

Update: Right after I hit publish on this post I went to clear out my RSS reader and noticed that Dave had come to similar conclusions and made the good point that people are forgetting that this is a business. One thing I thought was interesting: both Dave and I waited three or four days to comment on this. I think the longer you've blogged the more time you wait before commenting on something. The blogosphere is becoming more and more wild as the months and years progress. People are guilty-first, and everyone loves to pile-on.... yet you rarely see folks wait a couple of days to post about something. The take away for me is that waiting to hit the publish button is the new virtue.

I'm a blogger but I really want to write headlines...

• Battelle boosts book with blog--brilliant!
• Parsons pursues mobile magic--magnificent! [via Dealbreaker]
• Susannah showcases Xeni on SuicideGirls--sexy!
• Cargo crashes, Dumenco delighted--do dish!

• On the heals of YouTube cleaning up its act, MySpace will delete 200,000 objectionable profiles. Ross comments on making the Space more advertiser friendly--very, very smart move.
  
• The PVR is the network--wow.
• Apple *desktop* marketshare has been cut in half since Jobs became CEO... misleading headline since Apple is doing better than ever in terms of the overall health of the company. In related note, how would you like to be the CEO of Disney and have Steve Jobs show up at the next board meeting?!?! Oh to be a fly on that wall.
  
• John Battelle begs the founders of Facebook to take the money--spoken like a true vet who got hit hard when the bubbles popped. JBAT was at WIRED which had an IPO killed twice, and at the Industry Standard which he says turned down a similar offer (so that means the Standard got a ~1B offer and they didn't take it.... ouch!). I hear ya buddy... I've had three phone calls with entrepreneurs who've been offered 5-30M for their startups in the past month. My advice to all of them: sell now, Internet winter is coming. Here is how the conversation went with one of my friends:
  

Me: "Have you ever sold a company?"

Friend with offer: "No."

Me: "Do you TKTK million in you bank account right now?"

FWO: "No."

Me: "Are your parents going to put TKTK million in your bank account any time soon? Do you have a trust fund?"

FWO: "Uhhh... no."

Me: "Take the money."

FWO: "But what if I sell to early?"

Me: "Then you've done your job. You have three options in life: sell too early, sell exactly at the right moment, or sell too late. You want to be part of the first two groups--not the last group. And, history is the only thing that can tell you if you're in group 1 or 2. Trust me, I spent my life in group 3, now I'm part of group 1, and maybe some day I'll be able to join Mark Cuban in group 2. Heck, folks may look back at the blogging movement and say that we were in group #2. It's a process, and if you're a first time entrepreneur you take the money and hope the distance between group 1 and 2 isn't that big. Risk, reward."

Me (still going): "Trust me, get one under your belt--it changes everything. I get 10 calls a week from VCs asking me to invest in my next company... it's like the movie business: once you've made one movie your chances of doing a second movie go up exponentially."

[ Note: Mark had a solid sale before he had Broadcast.com, so when Microsoft offered him ~$100 for Broadcast.com he could walk away from it. That's the position you want to be in. Having a win under your belt changes *everything.* ]

Google has been working on Google Finance for a while now and today the wrapper came off and it's great. They Google Mapped the charts, as we all expected, and they are even leveraging some Flash (still trying to figure out why Flash is getting beaten by AJAX--cost? ease of use?)

JBAT makes note that they will have paid moderators, which he sees as the first sign that Google is getting into the editorial business. Google, of course, has taken a hard line from inception that they are not in competition with their content providers who run Google Adsense. However, Google Finance will certainly give pause to finance partners who run Adsense. Those partners have to now ask themselves "by running adsense are we supporting our competitor?"

This will of course push Yahoo more in the content business--look for Yahoo Finance to keep increasing their origional content offering. Yahoo has backed off claims they are not in the origional content business over the past year, and it's pretty obvious they are moments away from taking on Marketwatch, ThStreet.com, and WSJ: http://finance.yahoo.com/columnist/allbios

Om Malik thinks it's OK at best.

I have to say the charts are very impressive, in the same way GMAIL and Google Maps were impressive when they came out, but I'm sure everyone will update their charts in the next three to six months to catch up. For me the best part is that Google has included a Blog Posts section (image right)--wow, blogs as an information source for finance informtion--that's kind of bold, I wonder if Yahoo will do the same?

Update: They have a Weblogs, Inc. profile... neat. I wonder who put this together?

Update2: Jeff points out the Google, for the first time, has licensed content--something is happening here, and we all know what it is.