The Dumpster Brothers? Their last fucking name was Dumpster? Wild that that was just a common last name with no connection to trash for centuries
Both words are used, so I understand the confusion; also, sprinkled with a little misspelling:
Dumpster: The Dempster Brorthers, Inc.
EDIT: Just read the Dumpster Wikipedia page. The Dempster Brothers' had a truck called The Dempster Dumpmaster 😂
On cold nights, we’d gather together around the Dempster fire and discuss how bad things were, we’d share drinks and bond as the we burned the garbage to stay warm on those cold nights. No one could turn away for those Dempster fires as they were amazing to watch. Yep Everyone loved watching those Dempster fires
Wait until you learn about Thomas Crapper, who made major improvements to the modern toilet.
It's kind of indicative that the courts have bent to corporations on not generciding names for nearly 60 years. How long have dumpsters been so ubiquitous that no one even knew it was a brand? Very Berenstain Bears situation.
I agree. If dump was a word before (I'll have to check), then dumpster is a simple modification.
Trademarks are context sensitive, and zoom was not used as a term for video calls before that. It is interesting that that's the only one on the list that isn't also a made up word
Where do you draw the line between made up words and non-made up words? It’s not like a supernova explosion creates new words that land on a forming planet so that a billion years later a new sentient species can just pick them up from the ground and start using them.
True, but it has gained additional meaning and uses. Before 2011, you could not "join a zoom", for example.
The TV series was in 1972
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoom_%281972_TV_series%29?wprov=sfla1
Not to mention many of these are literally still brand names and have not in fact been ruled generic.
Oh I see now they've made the generic ones dark grey.
The Jeep one has kind of fallen out of normal use. Like, I wouldn't call a Land Rover or a Bronco a jeep.
If anything Jeep on this list is backwards. It was originally a generic term for that military style vehicle made by various manufacturers. Then it became its own thing as the Jeep brand. But then Jeep further broadened their offerings ( Cherokee, Patriot, compass, etc) and the Jeep became a wrangler. But when I say I drive a Jeep, everyone assumes specifically a wrangler.
When I read that my initial thought was more like a military jeep or any boxy army vehicle
My second thought was that one Mercedes jeep but that’s clearly not a jeep brand
That was the original idea I think. With the existence of SUVs that kind of went out the window.
The Mercedes is the G-Wagon. Which is quite well known in pop culture as such.
Well thanks for the name I see rarely mostly on the freeway and every time I see it I’m like “there’s no way a bad guy doesn’t have a convoy of these”
I would have never in a million years guessed the name is g wagon tho
Well, the official name is G-Class (or G-Klasse in German). G-Wagen is a colloquial name. Wagen means vehicle in German, btw., where the G-Class isn’t known as G-Wagen at all.
The G is short for Geländewagen (off road vehicle) btw., so calling it G-Wagen is kinda like calling it an ATM-Machine.
Yeah, I thought the word Jeep originally came from the military initials GP - General Purpose vehicle. The generic term 4x4 (four by four) is pretty common in the UK.
Who says "zoom" as a verb? People say "video chat" or, more realistically, "facetime" for all video chats.
I've heard a lot of people talk about "zoom meetings" when the meetings are actually held on google meet, or webx.
I've used Zoom in previous companies to speak to clients, and have never heard anyone use it as a term for video calls. I have absolutely no idea where this has come from, but it's definitely not true...
No one I know would use facetime... That suggests using a phone for a business meeting. Bad angles, shakey image.. very unprofessional.
For a business meeting you need a computer which means we're zooming, regardless of the platform
Yeah, it seems like facetime would be more at risk for becoming generic. If it weren't for Apple, that is.
Has 'zoom' become a generic term for video calling/conferencing? For example are people saying "let's zoom later on Skype" ?
I'm perhaps the worst zoomer to ask about zoomer stereotypes, but I haven't noticed my generation doing that. I have noticed my parents doing it though, after the pandemic any app that can do video calls is either "zoom" or "teams" depending on who you ask
Sometimes my boss will use mention "zoom" when scheduling a virtual meeting between us and clients, but we choose which platform we use and most of us don't use zoom. So its sorta being used like that.
I always hear people say “meets”, “FaceTime”, etc.. Zoom is definitely the most popular but I wouldn’t consider a generic term.
That's why when someone says "they have to protect their IP otherwise they lose it", they're full of shit. The bar for losing a trademark is essentially that no one can be reasonably expected to know it was a trademark.
When was the last time you heard someone use the term 'Xerox?'
iirc, it's used as another word for clone in some 1980's science fiction.
The legend I've heard is that the Xerox company built the first PC, complete with mouse, monitor, printer, and keyboard, but couldn't figure out how to market it. They let anyone come and see it, and kids like Jobs and Gates stole it for themselves. Maybe in the future, 'xerox' will mean 'didn't know a good thing when you had it." She dated that guy and dumped him right before he won the lottery. What a xerox!
Probably in the '90s, early 2000s. Usually it would be a teacher saying they needed to go make a Xerox/some xeroxes. I'm pretty sure some of those schools didn't actually have a Xerox-brand machine. I think most people say going to make a copy now, and it doesn't seem to be done nearly as often as it was 10 years ago.
Yup. By the early 00s it was rare to hear someone say xerox something but it was still pretty common in the late 90s. Offices in the military and civilian-military world.
I sometimes call in to an office to use their facilities and Melanie on reception will almost invariably ask me if I’m there to do some “ex a rock sing” (xeroxing) and I say yes and then ask if the “ex a rock” machine is in the usual place. We’ve been laughing at this one joke for over twenty years. Perhaps we should get out more?
I mean the last time I heard it was in Bojack Horseman. They had an episode called "Xerox of a Xerox"
It's the name for photocopy in India. Nobody would know what you mean if you say I need a photocopier.
I am reminded of the scene in the first 'Dr. Strange' movie where he goes into an ashram and gets the Wi-Fi password.
Typical exchange in Texas:
Person A: Can I have a coke?
Person B: What kind?
Person A: Dr Pepper
As if Coca-Cola would ever allow that to happen. They'd send death squads against the court that even thought about it.
Do people really use coke generically? I’ve always thought coke to refer solely to coca-cola. Maybe it’s just a regional thing.
Yeo. Root beer coke, Dr pepper coke, "get me a case of coke" "what type?" "Ginger ale" etc
Using "coke" as a generic word for soft drinks is very regional in the US. In a large part of the country you would get a funny look if you referred to some other brand as a coke. The law office that made this is in Colorado, and it looks like they're solidly in "pop" territory.
I've never heard Google, Uber or Zoom used unless it meant the specific company. "Google" became a verb, but I've never heard of someone saying they googled something on DuckDuckGo, for example.
"Google it" means look it up on the Internet. My kids don't use Chrome, they use Google (probably call it that because it's the homepage of Chrome).
I've heard people say they're going to uber home. They sometimes use Lyft.
And I've definitely heard people say they were on a zoom call even when it was Microsoft Teams or Google ...what is the Google one called again? I don't remember anymore because people will say Google zoom call!!
Citing a comment I've recently seen, it's amazing how humanity managed to produce only one generation actually competent with computers.
I don't know that I agree with that. Before my generation (X) the computer geeks had to flip dip switches to set IRQs. Before that there were punch cards. Before that there were vacuum tubes that needed to be replaced.
We've only really ever done what was needed to get our shit working with as little effort as possible. I've never used punch cards or changed vacuum tubes.
You've never heard zoom used as a regular word to mean fast? The word itself is older than the program.
Vaseline, Velcro, Mace and Styrofoam aren't generic? The fuck? I didn't even know those were trademarked names. Vaseline maybe, but the other three are common enough that I was sure they were generic.
It was previously commercialized as Lightning Fastener in NA, or hookless fastener in contrast with previous "technology".
Non-english languages sometimes have other words for it, if they encountered it before the Zipper was widespread. In Spanish we have cremallera and cierre. Old timers say fecho-de-correr or "fecho eclair" in Portuguese, referring to another patent holder Éclair Prestil.
Velcro brand doesn't want anyone to call the invention Velcro to protect the trademark: https://youtu.be/rRi8LptvFZY
The National Association of Realtors is pretty consistent at insisting anyone not associated with them is a real estate agent not a Realtor.
Really … that is interesting. I don’t know anyone not in the business that 1) knows this and 2) cares.
I'm not in the business. I've bought a house but other than that, don't have any dealings with real estate agents. I don't really care. But they do, so it's kinda plastered anywhere Realtor is used (all kinds of marks after the name) and I even vaguely remember TV ads about realtors being better than real estate agents or something.
From Wikipedia: A zipper, zip, fly, or zip fastener, formerly known as a clasp locker
Trampoline: The generic term for the trademarked trampoline was a rebound tumbler
I believe of someone ever asked me to use my Rebound Tumbler I'd be forced to punch them in the face.
Wait, are these the dates when the brand that eventually was deemed a "common word" were first trade marked? I was reading this as the years they were deemed common words.
Cause 2011 is WAYYYY too early for zoom to be common. If anything, that would've been Skype on 2011. Similar thing for Tupperware and zipper.
Also, wtf was heroin's common name before being branded heroin? Lol, also, I can't help but imagine heroin got its name as some kind of "there's a hero in every needle" marketing campaign.
year the brand name was first introduced.
It says so in the legend. Zoom has been a word for a long time but it now also means "participate in a (video) teleconference", which is a new meaning directly linked to the zoom software released in 2011. When a word became generic is usually very hard to pinpoint exactly (except for zoom that was 2020)
For heroin: I don't think there was heroin before the introduction of the heroin brand. Bayer literally invented the substance. (Wikipedia says it was invented 23 years earlier in Britain from morphine, but the inventer didn't do anything with it so it was reinvented later). It was also not a drug you take to get high, it was an over the counter cough suppressant; no needle or spoon or lighter involved. Wild times for sure...
It was diacetyl morphine before Bayer marketed it. Fun fact; the acetyl groups get cleaved before it binds to a receptor so it's just plain old morphine again.
Derp, thanks for pointing out the legend. Totally missed it as I gave the thing a once over.
But also, obviously this means heroin's name must come from "a hero in every pill"
It's from the German word "heroisch", which is basically "heroic". They used it being a homonym for "heroine" to use women heroes or Valkyrie in marketing for a bit, because it'll save you from that nasty cough.
It didn't really go by anything before, since it's not something super easy to make, and so the first people to really make a lot of it was Bayer, and they named it heroin.
Before heroin people had morphine, and heroin had been made as "diamorphine", but it just wasn't really a thing.
In the 80's there was a brand of cough suppressant pills with codeine (prescription only) called Tussigon, as codeine is a an anti-tussive (anti-cough).
In the UK: Hoover is what everyone called their vacuum cleaner. Can't stop for tea, I have the hoovering to do at home
I think it used to be more of a generic word for vacuuming in the US. I used to know a dog named Hoovie. Not sure why that seems to have lessened.
How did they both end up owning it? I checked Wikipedia but don't see where it explains how it happened.
I did a search and found this article that goes into more detail. They applied for a joint ownership trademark to basically stop anyone else from using the term super hero in books, movies, games, toys and more, including shoes?! Pretty interesting.
•
Aspirin & Heroin: Bayer
lost rights to its trademarks as a result of WWI
Thanks Gavrilo Princip. Do you know how much potential revenue you erased from the Bayer balance sheet?
That one is weird for us Aussies since a 'Solo' for us is a local lemon squash drink
Hearing 'Solo Cup' I just think of a cup of Solo haha
The red ones? We have those too but I think they're just called party cups. Put some Solo in there and you'd have a Solo Solo Cup!
Yep. And the reason I mentioned it is because I just bought some generic red cups from Target and got asked where the Solo Cups came from.