Beating Up The Little Guy
written by John Chow
I just received an Email from Gary Jones of Monster Hosting. I wrote about Gary’s web hosting business back in December after Ed Lau got a front page Digg on one of his stories. We were very impressed that the $4.95 per month webhosting plan Ed got was able to handle the Digg with no problems what so ever. Because of that, I recommend Monster Hosting to anyone looking for a place to host his or her blog.
The Email Gary sent informed me that he is changing the name of the company to BlueFur.com because of allegations of trademark infringement. Instead of fighting the allegations, Gary elected to settle the case out of court. Part of the agreement states he cannot reveal which company made the allegations against him, other than say it’s a very large US based company with deep pockets.
It won’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the allegations of trademark infringement came from Monster Cable. This company, which owns the “Monster” trademark, has been launching lawsuits against any company with Monster in their name. It was only a matter of time before they got to Monster Hosting. Or so I thought.
Turns out Monster Cable was not the company going after Monster Hosting, and since Gary wasn’t allowed to tell, I had to do some digging. Who would want to go after MonsterHosting.ca? Then it clicked in - MonsterHosting.COM! A whois check on MonsterHosting.com shows it’s own by Network Solutions. That would certainly qualify as a “large US company with deep pockets.”
Two Evil Guys
Monster Cable was founded by Noel Lee (pictured with me on the right). He’s a nice guy, very eccentric (he Segways around Vegas instead of walk) and extremely rich (net worth in the 100’s of millions). I think he likes the Segway because it makes him taller than me.
The fact that Lee’s company (he owns 100% of Monster Cable) sued every Tom, Dick and Harry with Monster in their name makes Noel a pretty evil guy, which may explain why I took a picture with him - we’re both Chinese and we’re both evil. However, I have a feeling that Noel is more evil than me (hard to imagine, huh?). I’m sure if Noel haven’t done so yet, he’ll unleash the monster lawyers on Network Solution’s ass real soon. For all I know, they may have already settled and Netsol now has the rights to use the Monster name for hosting.
To clear things up, Monster Hosting is now known as Blue Fur. I believe the promo code “JohnChowRocks” will still give you 15% off any hosting plan.
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They don’t call him the “Head Monster” for nothing. I mean, John’s got a big head, but it’s not nearly as big as Noel’s head! That’s one Monster Head!
That monster is a scary looking one…and monsters using segways? That’s gotta be the first.
Someone needs to sue Monster.ca then!
Boy, you both look evil indeed, John, you’re looking like you’d like to eat him
I think that Segway is pretty funny, but using it all the time not to have to talk, sounds a bit overdone to me, but well, if you’re that rich… I wouldn’t know 
Hmm… The MonsterHosting/BlueFur.com logo reminds me of Sulley from Monsters Inc. Could the big player have been Disney? Or are they next in line?
I used to sell Monster Cables when I worked at Radio Shack. Monster Cables our nice but they can be pricey.
damn, that guy is rich !! nice pic
Bummer of a story, but looking at the silver lining it’s a great opportunity to re-brand and get all your pals to plug your business all over again
I love the promo code John, that’s just awesome.
I’ve been looking to switch from Dreamhost for a while now, guess now I know where I’m going - If these guys can take the Digg effect & have 99% uptime guarantee, I think that’s a killer.
Allen.H
You don’t get a better a/v cable then monster. I have them on my stereo system/ entertainment center. Very expensive, but the quality is second to none. I think net worth of hundreds of millions is an understatement, try several billions.
I haven’t seen Noel on any Billionaire lists, unless he has grown quite a bit since the last update. Then again, he’s rich enough to fly around in a private jet, drive a Lambo, Ferrari, Porsche CGT, plus who knows what else. And there’s that Segway!
John, it has to be monster.com, the behemoth job search site.
Nope. Monster Cable went after Monster.com as well. They settle and Monster.com pays a fee to use the name. The same went for the Monster Inc movie and Monster Garage TV show.
I’m pretty positive it’s Network Solution, owner of the MonsterHosting.com domain.
That’s a pretty good story… my only question is: Why don’t you have a Segway?!
Man, if I get a Segway, I’ll be just as evil as Noel Lee!
Darn, I wish I would have found Monster Hosting before getting our new host. Since I don’t think I’ll be getting dugg anytime soon, I should be ok
Does Monster sue or do they write threatening letters about suing?
My dh’s web co got a threatening letter about their name and it’s similarity to a LARGE and unrelated company in US/Mexico and we just ignored it….
They sent one more and that was the last we heard!
As far as I know, none of the Monster lawsuits have made it to court. They were all settle out of court. But Monster Cable does have the resources to take it all the way if they need to.
I am just boggled by that…
I mean.how CAN you claim the word Monster as your own?
You don’t own the word?
It would be like me owning a company called Zombie or zombie.com and and then suing people who made zombie movies???
I figured they could sound mean and send mean letters to companies..and yes waste money and time with a court case..but do they legally have a right?
$4.99 am month? that is an amazing deal. I could care less what they are named. If the price is the same I don’t care. That is a good deal.
That is an amazing deal. I may have to consider switching after hearing about him being hounded by a short, evil Chinese dude that rolls a segway. Can you say Napoleon complex?
As an Englisman I should sue the B’stards for misuse (or use)of the English language, after all it’s more mine than theirs!!
[...] may recall my post about Monster Hosting changing their name to BlueFur.com because of some big US company threatening trademark infringement. Well the name change is almost [...]
[...] thing to come to mind. However, BlueFur.com is just that. I’d first heard of Blue Fur from John Chow’s blog. A reliable source, interesting information, why not take a look. I think Blue Fur delivers. One of [...]