Battle of the bad names: eevzDrop sues evzDrop

Two social apps based on audio have very similar names — but both are pretty bad.

Two companies based in Illinois are duking it out over a really bad name for a social networking app.

Eevzdrop, LLC (two e’s at beginning) has sued EvzDrop, Inc. (one e), saying the latter is infringing its Eevzdrop mark.

Both names are a play on “eavesdrop”, as both companies offer social apps that involve audio.

And both of the names miserably fail the “radio test”, meaning that someone who hears it aloud will have no clue how to spell it.

Last month the defendant allegedly demonstrated its product at an event entitled “Technori Pitch” held in Chicago. Some people in the audience were familiar with the plaintiff and were apparently confused.

It appears that the defendant may have gotten to market faster than the plaintiff, as the plaintiff’s app has not launched yet.

Although both companies are in Illinois, it’s at least possible that the defendant was not aware of the plaintiff when it selected its name. Consider these two lines from the lawsuit (pdf):

67. Plaintiff has at least one hundred eighty five (185) pre-registered consumers for its EEVZDROP App.
68. Defendant intentionally adopted the Plaintiff’s mark EEVZDROP knowing it was a nationally-recognized brand owned by Plaintiff.

Calling yourself nationally recognized when you only have 185 pre-registrations seems like a bit of a stretch.

Eevzdrop also claims that its eevzdrop.com is identical in sound, appearance, and meaning to Evzdrop’s domain name www.evzdrop.com.

I suppose that’s correct — if you can pronounce either of these. What makes it confusing to me is that none of them own eavesdrop.com.

Also confusing is that neither company appears to own the version of their names with an ‘s’ in place of the ‘z’. Multiple times writing this story I wrote the names as “EevsDrop” and “EvsDrop”.

If I were either of these companies I’d drop the dispute and find a better name.