Comment by PragmaticPulp | Hacker News Reader

Comment by PragmaticPulp | Hacker News Reader

This story is more outrageous in English, but the real reason becomes clear when you see the Japanese translation:

> “Crab” and “club” is one such case and to make matters worse, when rendered in Japanese katakana script they become identical: クラブハウス.

Apple already allows apps with similar names, as long as they're not deliberately misleading users.

The Clubhouse social media app is actually named "Clubhouse: Drop-in audio cha‪t‬" ( https://apps.apple.com/us/app/clubhouse-drop-in-audio-chat/i... )

A project management company already has the app named "Clubhouse" ( https://apps.apple.com/us/app/clubhouse/id1193784808 )

Cloning Clubhouse with similar sounding names is a trend in other countries, where companies are trying to capitalize on Clubhouse's popularity.

My favorite is "Club Horse" which is one of tens or hundreds of blatant Clubhouse clones that have popped up in China: https://twitter.com/pitdesi/status/1369682085833711618

If Crabhouse pivoted slightly to be a social media app for supporting trainee crustacean lawyers, maybe they could change the name of the app to "Crab - How sue?"

Badum-tish! Or rather, Sosumi sound

> one of tens or hundreds of blatant Clubhouse clones that have popped up in China

Clubhouse is powered by Agora, the Chinese audio tech provider.

Agora is founded by the same poeple from YY, a popular chat app and originally a Teamspeak clone.

Aside from the point that the backing technology doesn’t define where a service is “from”, it’s still a clone popped up in China no matter what’s being cloned?

Yeah, this is certainly a gray area though. If I release an app in America — do I own that parking spot everywhere? Personally, I think not

As long as it isn't a trademark, then you don't. There are thousands of businesses in the US that have the same names as other companies.

Yep, I think Apple is imposing its own international standards for trademarks, which feels like over-stepping but countries often don't place nice in these business areas. There should be some formal, international way to register your trademark ... oh, right. We have that [1]

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madrid_system

You could argue whether it is right or not for Apple to make the call if these "Clubhouse" are the same thing, a Social Audio Chat App.

But there is nothing similar about Crabhouse and Clubhouse. The whole point of Screenshots and description was to prevent just that.

I know, it is Apple's App Store, their store their rules. But someday this will backfire.

I thought this was about Clubhouse the project management app (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/clubhouse/id1193784808).

I suppose that given the pandemic’s possible sources a synonymous “Batshack” clone title wouldn’t be popular. Maybe “Bullymansion” would be better.

PangolinCage

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