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Comment by schappim | Hacker News Reader

You're going to want to change that name... Disney... They have the class 9 Trade Mark for Dumbo, and call out: "television sets;"[1][2].

[1] https://search.ipaustralia.gov.au/trademarks/search/view/115...

[2] https://files.littlebird.com.au/Shared-Image-2023-04-08-06-5...

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Yes, going to take care of that. Thanks for the heads up. I really looked that one over...didn't think too much of it as the domain was available. It's hard to do anything the easy way nowadays!

It's a great name for a non-smart tv, to be honest. But Disney'll be Disney. Good luck.

Might I recommend DUMBY?

Dumbox

What about something a bit more...positive? PureTV?

Or SimplyTV

Yeah, that was one of my first thoughts, but I figure SimpliSafe probably owns the trademark for household electronics.

Basic.tv

Edit: as in you have to code BASIC to change the channel

GOTO no longer considered unsafe! (Actually, it never really was all that unsafe, anyway, the function guys just established themselves as the new programming hipsters...)

JusTV

Perhaps too close to justin.tv (aka Amazon®)

jusTiVi

Taken for a product that bleeps out cuss words IIRC.

This sounds a little too close to PureFlix, which is a streaming service for family friendly/religious content.

How about IDIOT? Edit: Damn, there is 'IOT' in it.

PRIMITV

I would buy a good offline TV called "Primitv" in an instant

Nice. That is an absurdly good name.

I think it needs just a bit of fool-proofing in a couple dimensions though:

(1) Ideally, the brand would also be able to speak to the segment of people who aren't going to get the wordplay.

(2) Also, there's the age-old pronunciation question. Is it just "Primitive"? Is it "Primi - Tee - Vee"?

It's quite close to being a great brand, though. I wonder if it just needs a skillfully-placed lowercase letter, or a couple dots, or something — maybe some sort of subtle variation could solve both problems.

I think it’s perfect.

Eh, this isn’t that crazy.

Like, most people probably don’t think about the fact that Uniqlo is short for “unique clothing” and yet it’s the #3 clothing retailer in the world.

A good example, for which people also don't care about the pronunciation, which, being a japanese brand, is supposed to be ユニクロ (yunikuro) [jɯnikɯɾo]

>Also, there's the age-old pronunciation question. Is it just "Primitive"? Is it "Primi - Tee - Vee"?

PrimiTV.

As in: DirecTV.

Oh, that's just beautiful. You're hired.

That's really nice. Though there's a _slight_ chance that Amazon's lawyers might come knocking due to the similarity of Prime (TV?).

PRIVATY? PRIVATV?

privyTv :)

damn bro u out here just dropping names like this for free??? that's a $10k idea

This is an awesome name. Love it!

Absolutely topnotch, you could have a bright future in branding.

voting for this. it's perfect

Thanks for the positive feedback, guys! It was kind of a spontaneous inspiration.

Hi lagrange77, I like this name too. Thank you for the suggestion. It's a bummer that primi.tv is already taken, but I'm fairly optimistic that I can find another easy-to-remember domain. Also, I'll do some digging beforehand to make sure that I'm not overstepping any existing trademarks or copyrights. If everything works out, I'd like to give you one of these displays if and when I get the prototype unit off the ground. Would that be okay?

Hi pupdogg, thank you very much for the generous offer!

Actually, I don't own a TV, and besides, it would be the coolest story to tell when people ask me where I got this device. So I would like to gladly take you up on the offer IF you actually end up using the name, everything worked out as you hoped and you're in serial production.

I really like the design btw, clean, uniform bezels and logo-less. That's what i always look after for my computer displays.

I'll drop you an email. Thanks again :)

Sounds good. Thank you again! For time being, I was able to purchase and reserve primitv.co and primitv.net

Good domains are hard to come by. I've poked at getting primi.tv and will report back.

That would be awesome! Thank you. For time being, I was able to purchase and reserve primitv.co and primitv.net

What do you think of primitive.tv? That's available via godaddy.

There's a precedent with antismartphone, so maybe you can reuse it for tv.

Neat endeavor. PrimiTV is pretty good.

I wanna play the name game.

Perhaps something along the lines of:

'NOAD' - noad.tv - I could see a regular googler search for 'no ad TV'

Or some other word for 'dumb', 'not smart'. Like dunce.tv. dolt. simpleton. dullard. etc.

Maybe a play on the TCP error ENETUNREACH? hehe.

The IDIOT TV IDs the viewers with IOT technology :D

But who/what are you calling "idiot" and why? I would never think of calling that a plain HDTV set - it is still a technological marvel (and also would have all kinds of "smarts" built in anyway, just no apps or wifi).

Calling the version with no smarts “idiot” seems pretty clever to me.

"Idiot box" is an immediately-accessible slang term for television for me, but maybe the usage is a little old.

Yeah.... I never purchased any books in the "For Dummies" series out of self respect.

Beginning Programming for Dummies isn’t too bad.

because it's a synonym of dumbo

According sources in the Wikipedia article about: idiot:

The word "idiot" comes from the Greek noun ἰδιώτης idiōtēs 'a private person, individual' (as opposed to the state), 'a private citizen' (as opposed to someone with a political office), 'a common man', 'a person lacking professional skill, layman', later 'unskilled', 'ignorant', derived from the adjective ἴδιος idios 'personal' (not public, not shared). In Latin, idiota was borrowed in the meaning 'uneducated', 'ignorant', 'common', and in Late Latin came to mean 'crude, illiterate, ignorant'. In French, it kept the meaning of 'illiterate', 'ignorant', and added the meaning 'stupid' in the 13th century. In English, it added the meaning 'mentally deficient' in the 14th century.

The Id10TV

Haven’t checked availability but OnlyTV would be fitting.

Suggestion: STANDARD

Terrible. Imagine searching for "standard TV".

Kind of like framework laptop though. So while I agree search wouldn't be great to start, This isn't a TV for the masses if we're being honest. It will be high word of mouth and on niche tech sites.

Top 2 results: standardtvandapplicance.com and https://talent.nebula.tv/

not impossible

Also, marketing isn't only about search results. Another example: Standard Hotels

OK, then abbreviate it. "STD TV"

Wouldn't most people associate STD with Sexually Transmitted Disease?

Indeed, perhaps something like Simple Television Interface (STI) or Visual Display (VD) would be better? ;)

Not impossible to rank for. For example, see "stripe", or even my business, Keygen, which now ranks #1 for the term "keygen" after 7 years (funny fact: HN poked fun at me when I claimed I'd rank #1 for the term in my 2016 Show HN).

STANDARD is probably not the best choice for short-term SEO, though. :)

maybe something like dumb.box ? I think the .box suffix might be very appropriate, something like brainless.box or whatever, I know it's unconventional though, perhaps .tv is better

I live self deprecating humour but it negatively affects me at work, I imagine dumb.tv or idiot.tv may have similar problems. But maybe also you go viral because of it, who knows.

On that ground, how about justa.box.

Justa box, and nothing else.

Rolls nicely off the tongue, too.

Suggestion: NoTelly

Unhooked.Tech is one suggestion. That way if you want to expand into other devices / spaces, it is already covered.

this is a good example of a preemptive design choice. it's almost always better to optimize for success today, not for success in the future. imo a name like "slab", or even literally "dumb tv" would be much more effective.

Unhooked invoked “unplugged” with me. It is a good analogy for me. They can still put it as the Slab TV product under the Unhooked brand.

I don't know that I'd buy one, but I'd definitely want an answer to the question of "what the hell's an 'Unhooked Slab TV'?"

how about WiseTV?

Ooooh, that's good.

Might run into issues with Wyze electronics.

Might I suggest monsterenergy.tv

Suggestion: SMORT TV/SMORT Appliances

a sarcastic nod to smart.

Maybe consider picking another brand, sooner rather than later?

I like the name "dumbo", maybe coming from "dumb TV" and Jumbotron -- a nice, big TV/display without all the "smart TV" problems, and having fun naming something that's a bit of a cult niche -- but I also want your business to succeed.

(Disney has been putting their Dumbo on TV since at least the 1980s. I don't know whether there are other Dumbos, but I could imagine lawyer billable hours destroying your margin regardless of the theoretical defensibility. Also, separate from US govt. offices and courts, there's ICANN, and I guess you could suddenly lose your domain name that way.)

Probably best to avoid the conflict, per your advice. But if they're not really using the mark that way I doubt it's enforceable.

You will make lawyers rich proving that. Even if you win, odds are you don't have enough cash to make the product after that fight.

TAPKAST: The Appliance Previously Known As Smart TV

I contains Tap and Cast (ok, Kast...) plus giving a nod to the famous Prince name copyright case.

LighTV, the tv without the crap you don’t want!

That's not fair!

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