Body Double – Novel Ideas West meets East

August 12, 2008

Now it seems that there are two other Novel Ideas companies in the nation. I’m guessing the count is much higher, but when I opened my writing services firm on January 1, 1992 I didn’t realize that the world would shrink so much as the Internet brought us together.

With my Novel Ideas writing site at Ideas2Words dot com – www.ideas2words.com – I attract a modest amount of business. But as you can guess, the reason my Novel Ideas site isn’t at NovelIdeas.com is two-fold.

One – the name was taken. Pure and simple. Novel Ideas is a bookmark company in North Carolina. Good name. Fair product. I was too slow.

Two – NovelIdeas looks like Noveiideas or NoveLLdeas when written out. Having two of the same letter – unless you’re google – in your domain name is bad news. So I haven’t pursued it.

But now there’s a writer marketing herself and her company – Novel Ideas – out in the western part of the United States.

What to do? Cease and desist? Nice letter asking her to give up the name? Combine forces and have two offices of Novel Ideas?

I don’t know. Send me your suggestions.

Right now I’m on a writing sabbatical, but still have some billing through both Jeff Cutler and Novel Ideas. So the company isn’t on hiatus and isn’t going away.

It begs the question of intellectual property in this age of fast-moving people and concerns.

Keep reading…I’ll let you know how it all turns out.