Techdirt. Stories filed under "restaurant" Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us Techdirt. Stories filed under "restaurant"http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Fri, 30 Nov 2012 11:40:24 PST Psy Elects Not To Go Legal Over Gangnam Style Restaurant Timothy Geigner http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121130/07352221184/psy-elects-not-to-go-legal-over-gangnam-style-restaurant.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121130/07352221184/psy-elects-not-to-go-legal-over-gangnam-style-restaurant.shtml cultural blitz surrounding the song/video Gangam Style and its creator, Korean pop sensation Psy. One of the themes of the article was how Psy's seeming permisiveness for the internet community's repurposing of his song to spread the fun around resulted in something of a turbo-charge effect on its popularity. It turns out that this understanding of how digital culture can help spread an artist's popularity wasn't a one time thing for Psy.

Recently, a Korean restaurant in Los Angeles closed up shop for a few weeks as it changed its name to Gangnam Style, without even attempting to get Psy's permission, obviously looking to build their business on the song's popularity. While one might cringe at the expected legal result of the use of the song's title, you can safely un-cringe; Psy not only isn't going after the owners of the restaurant, he loves what they did.
"Gangnam Style" singer Psy will NOT sue an L.A. restaurant for naming itself after the famous song -- in fact, Psy's pumped ... because as far as he's concerned ... imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

The restaurant never bothered to get Psy's permission to use the name -- but sources close to the singer tell TMZ, he doesn't give a crap ... because where he comes from, imitation is a form of honor.
The larger point being that there's no harm from the restaurant's move and the possibility for further cultural penetration. While I appreciate Psy's inaction legally, I would actually suggest he go a step further and embrace the restaurant by reaching out and working directly with them. Why not have his music playing there? Why not have CDs or merchandise available for purchase, with some kind of agreement worked out with the restaurant? Not obstructing is wonderful, but I would suggest more collaboration by the artists to further their monetization and success. Why the hell not?

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]]> oppa http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20121130/07352221184 Thu, 19 Jul 2012 05:10:42 PDT US Olympic Committee Forces 30 Year Old Philidelphia Gyro Restaraunt To Change Its Name Timothy Geigner http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120713/06513919689/us-olympic-committee-forces-30-year-old-philidelphia-gyro-restaraunt-to-change-its-name.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120713/06513919689/us-olympic-committee-forces-30-year-old-philidelphia-gyro-restaraunt-to-change-its-name.shtml
Oh, and they also like to stifle links to critical pieces (do we have your attention, boys?), by banning their fans from sharing their experiences via social media, and threatening ICANN for refusing to block Olympic-related terms. And, now, Steve M shares a story from the Philadelphia Daily News about how the United States Olympic Committee has won a 30 year battle they didn't know they were fighting with a gyro shop.
"Three decades after it burst from the starting block, the Greek eatery Olympic Gyro has received a cease-and-desist email from the USOC, the nonprofit corporation responsible for training and funding U.S. teams. The June 7 notice demanded deletion of the word "Olympic" from the food shop's title, claiming copyright of the word under a 1978 law."
This legislative insanity, which I assume is entitled "The USOC Can Do Whatever It Wants Because Olympics Act Of 1978", basically grants the USOC sole usership of the word "Olympic" in the United States, amongst other travesties. They issued a heartfelt email in response to this issue:
"The USOC communications department declined to discuss the matter with the Daily News. But in its email, the organization emphasized the need to "protect the rights of companies who financially support the U.S. Olympic Team," such as McDonald's and Coca-Cola."
Yup, the USOC asserted that it needs to protect the rights of their sponsors (which means they're protecting themselves, by the way) from these no-good gyro shop owners who have apparently been harming McDonald's and Coca-Cola for the past thirty damned years, but with some kind of stealth cloaking device that keeps any such harm from being realized.

Oh, and just for fun, let's look at a few names of the governors of the organizations involved in this story. The USOC is headed up by Larry Probst (not Greek). Coca-Cola is run by Muhtar Kent (not Greek). McDonalds' CEO is James Skinner (not Greek). And the gyro stand formely known as Olympic Gyro's owner is Athens Voulgaridis (more than slightly Greek). The irony of this was apparently not lost on Voulgaridis:
"It's been a part of my life as long as I can remember," Voulgaridis said Tuesday. "We're very Greek Orthodox, we go back [to Greece] often. For them to take something that is Greek and make it theirs for money is frustrating."
But he also states that he isn't going to fight the government. In total, the name change will cost his business $6000 or so, since he has to change both signage and employee uniforms. He contacted the USOC to see if they would help out with those costs, but they declined, explaining that money is valuable and they didn't want to spend any.

The same Daily News article also mentions that the USOC went after a knitting group named Ravelry that was organizing something of a knitting olympics competition to coincide with The Games:
"We believe using the name ‘Ravelympics' for a competition that involves an afghan marathon, scarf hockey and sweater triathlon, among others, tends to denigrate the true nature of the Olympic Games," the letter from USOC said. "In a sense, it is disrespectful to our country's finest athletes and fails to recognize or appreciate their hard work."
Yes, you read that correctly. Knitting competitions denigrate the true nature of the Olympic Games. Which I happen to agree with, assuming that this "true nature" they're talking about revolves around screwing with people for no good reason.

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]]> its-all-Greek-to-me http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20120713/06513919689 Wed, 16 Jan 2008 18:31:00 PST Need A Reservation For The Latest Hot Restaurant? Buy One Online. Dennis Yang http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080115/125815.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080115/125815.shtml The Little Owl, diners have to hit the phones exactly 30 days prior to their desired date and hope to be one of the few chosen. The result is less like planning a nice evening out, and more like trying to win a radio show call-in prize. Tablexchange.com is hoping to change that by allowing diners to buy and sell their reservations to hot restaurants in New York, San Francisco, and the Hamptons. The site, and others like it like Tablepronto (which covers San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas), work without the consent or knowledge of the restaurants -- in fact, when you "buy" a reservation, you are actually instructed to not change the name or details of the reservation, so you must check in under the original reservation's name. These sites are reminiscent of reservation scalper PrimeTimeTables, which was hotly debated last year. Unlike these marketplace sites, PrimeTimeTables charges their members a $500 annual fee and uses their supposed "connections" to score the hard-to-get reservations (annoying some restaurants in the process). Tablexchange claims that they are less shady since they simply provide a marketplace that is more efficient than, say, Craigslist for this purpose. However, if the Tablexchange model gains traction, it could create a legion of professional reservation traders that would then compete with diligent foodies who are trying hard to get a reservation through normal (free) means.

This debate is much like the ticket scalping debate that we have seen here again and again. This market for reservations has simply surfaced the fact that there are people willing to pay for reservations that are currently free. With any limited good, charging money is a good way to decide who ultimately ends up with that limited good. That said, the power still lies with the restaurant -- if they are really against this practice, they are free to take measures against it, such as check their diner's IDs. Or, perhaps they can recognize the existence of this market and capitalize on it by setting aside a few tables that are "biddable." The Little Owl already does the converse today -- every night, at least three tables are set aside for walk-in customers, with the rationale that this practice maintains the "neighborhood" feel of the restaurant. So, it doesn't seem like a huge stretch to allow for some reservations to be bought and sold as well.

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