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Subject:Re: verb forms related to Twitter ? From:Bill Swallow <techcommdood -at- gmail -dot- com> To:Lauren <lauren -at- writeco -dot- net> Date:Wed, 14 Sep 2011 16:35:19 -0400
In context of Tweeting, Twitter is dead on within their rights to
define how their brand should be represented.
Google also insists that you Google something online, not google it.
Sure, you can search online, but if you're searching via Google, then
you're Googling it, not googling it.
It comes down to how much of an issue you want to make of this.
They've invested heavily in their brand, as any company does, so of
course they have guidelines on how to talk about it. Whether you
choose to accept those guidelines or not is up to you, but I always
err on the side of fair play. They created the technology, and if
you're integrating with it or otherwise writing about it, then it's
only fair play to follow their style guidelines. After all, your
company would appreciate the same.
On Wed, Sep 14, 2011 at 3:56 PM, Lauren <lauren -at- writeco -dot- net> wrote:
> On 9/14/2011 7:00 AM, Peter Neilson wrote:
>>
>> Monique's inquiring mind wants to know about
>>>
>>> capitalized “Tweeted”.
>
>> http://support.twitter.com/entries/77641
>>
>> It appears that they are trying to cut new pathways within the field of
>> trademark law. They say you cannot use misspellings of their trademarks. The
>> resulting discussion of verb forms goes into areas I cannot even bring
>> myself to mention.
>
> Twitter seems to be pushing limits a bit when it says, "Please remember to
> capitalize the T in Twitter and Tweet!"
>
> Style rules suggest that a Twitter post is a "tweet," with a lowercase "t."
> Twitter wants to inject its branding into the documents of others by
> requiring an uppercase "t." Unless, there is a risk of losing support from
> Twitter, like they block an account because someone used proper style rules,
> then I say to use a lowercase "t."
>
> What Twitter is saying about "confusion" is correct, but they are stretching
> things a little bit and seem to want to compel others to assist with
> co-branding their product for free.
>
> TESS at the US PTO (http://tess2.uspto.gov/) shows many registered
> trademarks of "tweet." When used in reference to a post on Twitter, a tweet
> is a verb and not a brand name. Most style guides require that brand names
> be capitalized, but this requirement does not apply to actions of the brand.
> Discussions of Xerox and Google, illustrate this rule. People
> inappropriately would say they would "Xerox a document," when they referred
> to using a Xerox copier to copy a document. Today, people will "Google the
> Internet," when they use the Google search engine. Any forms of Xerox and
> Google, must be capitalized, even if they are inappropriately used as verbs.
> I think Twitter is stretching style rules when it requires the
> capitalization of "tweet."
>
> I think that if Twitter wants to be difficult in requiring what looks like
> advertising for Twitter as part of a the TOS, then, in the long run, they
> may lose support from companies that do not want to break various grammar
> and style rules just to comply with the demands of Twitter.
>
> I favor Tony's suggestion of calling a "tweet" what it is, a "post" to
> Twitter. Skip the entire co-branding, advertising, what-not that Twitter is
> trying to foster.
>
> Really, there are multiple social media applications that accept posts, so
> whether a person or an automated application posts to Twitter, Facebook,
> MySpace, Google+, a collection of cell phone subscribers, an RSS feed, or
> any number of other media applications, a post is a post, and only a post to
> Twitter is a tweet. I think it is best to avoid the word "tweet," since I
> favor transferable documentation. What if the Twitter part of an
> application was replaced by something else. A simple search and replace can
> change "Twitter," but do you really want the hassle of changing all
> references to communication with the social media application? One
> additional consideration is that posts to Twitter have a character limit for
> what is fully displayed in timelines, the word "tweet" has one more letter
> than the word "post," so logically, the word "post," is a better choice for
> describing posts to any social media.
>
> Lauren
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