Ask HN: What if you woke up & another company was your doppleganger?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3935787
by jfdi • 14 years ago
4 3 14 years ago

I have been working on a hobby project -> startup conversion, albeit for far too long.

I bought the domain name (.co), the .com was taken by a squatter (not a big deal), and I registered a facebook app with that name to support development.

I failed to obtain the twitter handle or facebook page for my application. Wow - lesson learned here. But I had been focused on dev and missed this. I also failed to incorporate or apply for trademark because I had assumed I could take that step later, closer to launch.

So long story short - I do periodic competitive research and check in on my very new and upcoming brand. I haven't launched yet so when I search for my company name I should find essentially nothing of note.

I searched recently and found that my exact company name and charter at a high level (online commerce, really simple), literally is being done out of Asia - Singapore or Korea from what I can tell. There are a group of seemingly got-there-themselves people who formed up and coded up what looks like my backend at a hackathon. They do seem legit in the sense that they're trying to make it work and they came up with the name themselves perhaps.

My question is this -- I'm 4-6 months from launch, I can't see a world where I entirely rename my company. The name is outstanding. I now have this startup I'd like to make at least rename and give up their twitter and facebook handles -- but they'd probably want me to give up my domain and app name.

Any advice/guidance on this based on your experience? Is it worth me just finishing my product and then worrying about the name?

* the question: Should I just forget about it, and once I'm ready to launch change my name so something else that's free? Should I get a lawyer on board and go fight this now while they're young? Not that I have vast resources though, still on the pre-launch bootstrap budget. Something else?

I would cringe if they were successful - seeing my "baby" name on another company doing what I am doing...

Thanks ahead HN

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