I'm siding with WhosHere on this one (although it doesn't matter). Here's why.
First, they asked Brian to change the name from "Who's Near Me" to something else, and he apparently agreed to, but his rebranding was to "WNM (Who's Near Me) Live" which is basically the same thing except that "Who's Near Me" is written smaller and acronym-ized in the brand. But it's still the same name.
Second, a lot of people are talking about how the name is generic. That's exactly the point. When you're using your phone and see "Who's Here", you think, this will tell me who's here. If there's another app that's called "Who's Near Me", you think the same thing. So it's more than just them both having the word 'who'. It's more like if one app were called "Shoelaces" that tied your shoelaces for you, and then another app named itself "Tie Your Shoelaces" and did the same thing. It's, people will look at this app and know that this is what they use to tie their shoelaces, a trademark should prevent another app from being able to do that.
Third, "It is also offensive to me that you would think my time was only worth $100/hr, considering I turn down requests offering 4 times that rate regularly". I'm tired of the fake arrogance in C.S. culture. Brian's 26, I don't think he regularly gets offers for $400 an hour, and even if he did there's no reason to put it in that e-mail.
This is impersonal and based on limited information.
I thought the same thing when the opening sentence of his blog post mentioned he had been coded since age 7. I have no reason to believe or not believe that point. But I don't see how that has anything to do with the problem he was about to outline in his blog. Apparently he has a huge trust fund... he could have opened with that.
But I'm still in the "they're generic enough that this shouldn't be a problem" camp.
I'd say the coded since age 7 bit was to try to get people to emotionally connect with him, and thereby get the tide of public opinion on his side. Just one of the many possible tools in the chest when going to a public war.
Weak sauce. It just seems to me a slight trend lately. The age people started coding is creeping lower. Just like the "Check out this app I wrote in random time"... random time seems to be creeping lower too. Maybe I'm wrong. But none the less, what age you started says an entirely different thing about you than what year you started.
First, they asked Brian to change the name from "Who's Near Me" to something else, and he apparently agreed to, but his rebranding was to "WNM (Who's Near Me) Live" which is basically the same thing except that "Who's Near Me" is written smaller and acronym-ized in the brand. But it's still the same name.
Second, a lot of people are talking about how the name is generic. That's exactly the point. When you're using your phone and see "Who's Here", you think, this will tell me who's here. If there's another app that's called "Who's Near Me", you think the same thing. So it's more than just them both having the word 'who'. It's more like if one app were called "Shoelaces" that tied your shoelaces for you, and then another app named itself "Tie Your Shoelaces" and did the same thing. It's, people will look at this app and know that this is what they use to tie their shoelaces, a trademark should prevent another app from being able to do that.
Third, "It is also offensive to me that you would think my time was only worth $100/hr, considering I turn down requests offering 4 times that rate regularly". I'm tired of the fake arrogance in C.S. culture. Brian's 26, I don't think he regularly gets offers for $400 an hour, and even if he did there's no reason to put it in that e-mail.
This is impersonal and based on limited information.