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Facebook moves to shut down busker crowdfunding website

By | Published on Thursday 28 November 2013

Facebusks

Busker crowdfunding website FaceBusks has launched a campaign to convince Facebook to withdraw a cease and desist order issued against it.

FaceBusks allows buskers to crowdfund money for related projects, like recording an album, as well as donating some of their donations to charity. Launched in 2009, problems arose for the company earlier this year after it applied to register the FaceBusks name as a trademark.

In a letter to the busker site’s founders Servais Louis and Jo’rel Mitchell, reported by Trademarks + Brands, Facebook’s legal team said that it was “obvious that the marks are similar and that relevant consumers may establish a link between Facebook’s earlier signs”. While stating that the social network hoped to reach an amicable solution, it would “use all of the means available to them to contest the registration”.

Mitchell told The Drum this week: “We’ve been told by our lawyers there’s no legal standpoint, Facebook is a massive entity, and has the ability to draw out the process to the point where we don’t even get in front of a judge and we’re already exhausted financially”.

So, unable to afford the fight via legal means, FaceBusks has instead launched a petition, hoping to appeal to Facebook’s better nature and drop the claim against it. View the petition here.



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