Jack Dorsey is developing an economic platform (Blocks)

PrimeNumber7

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Quote from: DaveF on December 21, 2021, 08:41:53 AM

Quote from: PrimeNumber7 on December 20, 2021, 04:34:37 AM

....
There are multiple overlapping products that both H&R Block and "Block" (fka Square) offer.

Up until now I did not know H&R as anything other then "those tax people".
Possibly I just did not notice, so when I got to the office I asked the 2 other people who were there, one of which is a bookkeeper if they knew what else H&R block did and all I got was "aren't they tax people"

So with my sample size of 3 most people just see H&R as tax people. However, they DO other things, how much I don't know but I can see them needing to / wanting to defend the trademark. OTOH, asking people what Square does you will probably get a longer list of stuff so H&R might have a bit of an uphill battle.

The other side of the coin is that as of NOW H&R Block has a market cap of $4 billion on revenue of $3.4 billion (as of the end of their last fiscal year)
Block / square has a market cap of $73 billion on revenue of $9.4 billion (as of the end of their last fiscal year) and as of now are on the way to having a $17 billion dollar year this year.
In theory Block / Square could absorb H&R somewhat easily. And add to their portfolio and services group.

-Dave

I think most of H&R Block's businesses are all related to their tax preparation services. For example, I believe most of their lending services is related to them giving customers (near) instant access to their tax refund via a loan that is secured by their tax refund. I suspect most of these products is a means to sell their tax preparation services to people who have an immediate need for money.

Most of Block's revenues come from products that do not compete with H&R Block, such as credit card processing.

Cash App, which is owned by Square, purchased a tax preparation business from Credit Karma last year.

Also, just because a company has more revenue, it doesn't mean their reputation is necessarily better, or that they are shielded if they were to start using another company's trademark. For example, Ford's revenue is ~$127 billion, compared to Ferrari's EUR~3.4 billion, but even though both companies make good cars, with very few exceptions, Fords are not worth several hundred thousand dollars that Ferraris will often sell for. So if Ford were to start selling under the trade name Ferrari and were to sell what is basically a Mustang as a Ferrari, it would clearly be confusing to customers, and would be using the Ferrari brand that is not owned by Ford.

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Quote from: PrimeNumber7 on December 20, 2021, 04:34:37 AM

....
There are multiple overlapping products that both H&R Block and "Block" (fka Square) offer.

Up until now I did not know H&R as anything other then "those tax people".
Possibly I just did not notice, so when I got to the office I asked the 2 other people who were there, one of which is a bookkeeper if they knew what else H&R block did and all I got was "aren't they tax people"

So with my sample size of 3 most people just see H&R as tax people. However, they DO other things, how much I don't know but I can see them needing to / wanting to defend the trademark. OTOH, asking people what Square does you will probably get a longer list of stuff so H&R might have a bit of an uphill battle.

The other side of the coin is that as of NOW H&R Block has a market cap of $4 billion on revenue of $3.4 billion (as of the end of their last fiscal year)
Block / square has a market cap of $73 billion on revenue of $9.4 billion (as of the end of their last fiscal year) and as of now are on the way to having a $17 billion dollar year this year.
In theory Block / Square could absorb H&R somewhat easily. And add to their portfolio and services group.

-Dave

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Quote from: noorman0 on December 19, 2021, 07:17:27 PM

Dorsey faces a nightmare with his new brand.
[~snip~]
If so, I actually found several other companies that could potentially sue Dorsey in the future under the brand name "Block", such as Block.eu and BlockCRS. Was it just because of a Dorsey that he was sued?

Not unexpected.

Many child games are based on blocks.
Many Tetris clones are Blocks / falling blocks.

Dorsey seems to have a "problem" with picking names. Square is also a very common word Cheesy

, and since he and his lawyers have handled Square, they may handle Block too, good enough.

PrimeNumber7

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Quote from: noorman0 on December 19, 2021, 07:17:27 PM

Dorsey faces a nightmare with his new brand.

Quote from: https://edition.cnn.com/2021/12/16/investing/h-r-block-trademark-lawsuit/index.html

H&R Block is suing Block, the digital payments company previously known as Square, for trademark infringement.

The 65-year-old company said in a press release Thursday that CEO Jack Dorsey's company "appears to be taking a shortcut to capitalize on the well-known Block moniker. H&R Block alleged that the change is a "clear violation of Block's trademark rights" that might cause consumer confusion.

To be honest I just heard of H&RBlock company and I don't know if the service is bigger scale (not just 3 countries) because the reason for the lawsuit is to capitalize on the popularity of synonym brands even though the two are not exactly the same, not even sure that the name is more popular than a Jack Dorsey.

If so, I actually found several other companies that could potentially sue Dorsey in the future under the brand name "Block", such as Block.eu and BlockCRS. Was it just because of a Dorsey that he was sued?

You can only have a valid trademark with regards to business lines you regularly conduct business in.

So for example, if a company were to sell fruit and call itself "Apple", the company "Apple" (that sells iPhones and MacBooks) could not do anything to stop this fruit company from using the "Apple" name because each company does not engage in similar business.

OTOH, if a company were to sell computer accessories under the trade name "Apple", the company "Apple" (that sells iPhones) could sue this entity for trademark infringement because both entities sell computer accessories.

There are multiple overlapping products that both H&R Block and "Block" (fka Square) offer.

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Quote from: noorman0 on December 19, 2021, 07:17:27 PM

H&R Block is suing Block, the digital payments company previously known as Square, for trademark infringement.

This is very weird because the word "block" is not a special word that anyone can own as their own "brand". It is a generally used term in cryptocurrency world, for example there is a ton of explorers or exchanges that used the word "block" in their name (blockchain, blockchair, blockr,...).
It's not like they invented the word (something like "Microsoft") that they can own the right to this word!

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[Nope]No hype delivers more than hope

Dorsey faces a nightmare with his new brand.

Quote from: https://edition.cnn.com/2021/12/16/investing/h-r-block-trademark-lawsuit/index.html

H&R Block is suing Block, the digital payments company previously known as Square, for trademark infringement.

The 65-year-old company said in a press release Thursday that CEO Jack Dorsey's company "appears to be taking a shortcut to capitalize on the well-known Block moniker. H&R Block alleged that the change is a "clear violation of Block's trademark rights" that might cause consumer confusion.

To be honest I just heard of H&RBlock company and I don't know if the service is bigger scale (not just 3 countries) because the reason for the lawsuit is to capitalize on the popularity of synonym brands even though the two are not exactly the same, not even sure that the name is more popular than a Jack Dorsey.

If so, I actually found several other companies that could potentially sue Dorsey in the future under the brand name "Block", such as Block.eu and BlockCRS. Was it just because of a Dorsey that he was sued?

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Quote from: ?? on ??

Quote from: PrimeNumber7 on December 12, 2021, 06:07:31 PM

Quote from: ?? on ??

I just tried about 15 TLD and all of them are taken, so i can see why they decide to choose .xyz rather than longer domain with .com TLD (such as block-dev.com). Even so, it still give bad first impression even though their business already established.

The whois for block.xyz changed in mid-December. My guess is that Square (who was named square at the time) purchased the domain around that time.

It's interesting fact. But since it's .xyz domain, i wonder if they tried to get better TLD (such as .com or .io), but only owner of .xyz is interested to sell the domain.

Its possible that xyz was the first to respond, or other owners of other TLDs were able to find out that square was trying to buy “block.*” and tried to get exorbitant amounts for the domain.

I would think that a referral link on block.io would generate a decent amount of money, so a high price wouldn’t be completely unreasonable.

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Quote from: pooya87 on December 12, 2021, 03:59:04 AM

-snip-
So I wouldn't really be surprised if he eventually created an altcoin and started spreading FUD about bitcoin at some point in near future. He certainly wouldn't be the first person to do something like this...

Just came across old news, this should have been placed on the OP to solidify my opinion.

Quote

Square is going to make a hardware wallet for bitcoin

CEO Jack Dorsey said the company was considering one in June

Yeah, people should have their own doubts about a public figure. It could be that Jack is just taking advantage of his popularity or the momentum behind it all. Don't know, what kind of hard wallet is being developed (or this has been discontinued). If the wallet can't generate the privatekeys/seeds, that's clearly BS development.

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Quote from: bL4nkcode on December 07, 2021, 12:07:09 PM

Quote from: ABCbits on December 07, 2021, 04:12:56 AM

I can't believe they actually use .xyz rather than .com or .io. For a second i thought you include wrong link.

Most common/famous domain extension with the domain block is already taken since its considered as premium domain. Maybe some are for sale but with too high amount of course. .xyz is too suspicious and cheap extension actually but since the business is already established I guess the domain extension doesn't matter anymore.

I just tried about 15 TLD and all of them are taken, so i can see why they decide to choose .xyz rather than longer domain with .com TLD (such as block-dev.com). Even so, it still give bad first impression even though their business already established.

The whois for block.xyz changed in mid-December. My guess is that Square (who was named square at the time) purchased the domain around that time.

Quote from: DaveF on December 07, 2021, 11:56:10 AM

Quote from: PrimeNumber7 on December 07, 2021, 09:34:35 AM

No, he is trying to ride a trend to get rich quickly. Compared to coinbase, square is overvalued by a factor of about 5 (so if coinbase's price stays flat, the price of block should fall by about 80%).

Going to have to disagree with you there.
From what I see square is everywhere¹. Just about every small merchant I have been in lately is using them.
I think between their aggressive CC processing fees and cashapp integration and online ordering included for restaurants and so on they are just grabbing business.
Add in the payroll and banking stuff that they do and I really see them just taking over.

-Dave
¹ Admittedly it's a small everywhere, but all over the place in downstate NY and NYC, southern CT and northern NJ. Which is admittedly all urban / dense suburbia. For all I know they don't exist out of this area.

~~Square~~ Block does seem to have a decently sized market share for credit card processing for small businesses. However payment processing is a very competitive business.

Most of Square's valuation seems to come from its Cash App business. They charge fees to do things like withdraw to their bank account "instantly" or withdraw from an ATM. I am actually surprised that anyone would pay for these types of services. Maybe I am just lucky that I am able to keep enough money in the bank so that I would never need to utilize this type of service.

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Quote from: pooya87 on December 12, 2021, 03:59:04 AM

Quote from: noorman0 on December 06, 2021, 10:54:28 AM

it's clear that Jack wants to focus more on blockchain space. Will Jack be the next person to influence the global economy, especially bitcoin, to rival Elon's influence as the richest man? Keep in mind that Jack is very supportive of bitcoin, and I don't think he's going to create his own version of a new cryptocurrency.

A while back when Dorsey's tweets came coming out about bitcoin and how he praised it I said he may pull another Musk in the near future. Obviously he hasn't yet started FUDing bitcoin but at the same time he has been gaining popularity by "praising bitcoin" (like others did before him) and have been using that popularity to make money from different businesses he runs. From the exchange service to this and some more.

So I wouldn't really be surprised if he eventually created an altcoin and started spreading FUD about bitcoin at some point in near future. He certainly wouldn't be the first person to do something like this...

Unlike Musk he already has a commerce platform (cashapp) that deals with money and BTC so if he really wanted to go anti BTC it would easy to do since all he would have to do is add it / integrate it with an already existing financial platform. Personally I don't think he will. I think he is going to keep coming out with other apps / things to keep your BTC in his eosystem.
Add an exchange, add easier BTC payments to merchants, add more features to cashapp. All while making a percentage on every transaction.

-Dave

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Quote from: noorman0 on December 06, 2021, 10:54:28 AM

it's clear that Jack wants to focus more on blockchain space. Will Jack be the next person to influence the global economy, especially bitcoin, to rival Elon's influence as the richest man? Keep in mind that Jack is very supportive of bitcoin, and I don't think he's going to create his own version of a new cryptocurrency.

A while back when Dorsey's tweets came coming out about bitcoin and how he praised it I said he may pull another Musk in the near future. Obviously he hasn't yet started FUDing bitcoin but at the same time he has been gaining popularity by "praising bitcoin" (like others did before him) and have been using that popularity to make money from different businesses he runs. From the exchange service to this and some more.

So I wouldn't really be surprised if he eventually created an altcoin and started spreading FUD about bitcoin at some point in near future. He certainly wouldn't be the first person to do something like this...

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Quote from: ?? on ??

I just tried about 15 TLD and all of them are taken, so i can see why they decide to choose .xyz rather than longer domain with .com TLD (such as block-dev.com). Even so, it still give bad first impression even though their business already established.

I guess the other question is, if it's not .com does anyone care?
Followed by, if they do care did they do any research into what extensions matter?

I was thinking about it while driving home the other day and actually thought this is one of those things that I could see some mid level executive spending thousands of dollars and hours of time on getting research done to see what domain extensions appeal to which people.

We see here and think xyz is not a good thing, but I'll bet there is somebody someplace who put together a 90 minute power point presentation as to which domain extensions appeal to which demographic group.

-Dave

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Quote from: ABCbits on December 07, 2021, 04:12:56 AM

I can't believe they actually use .xyz rather than .com or .io. For a second i thought you include wrong link.

Most common/famous domain extension with the domain block is already taken since its considered as premium domain. Maybe some are for sale but with too high amount of course. .xyz is too suspicious and cheap extension actually but since the business is already established I guess the domain extension doesn't matter anymore.

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Quote from: PrimeNumber7 on December 07, 2021, 09:34:35 AM

No, he is trying to ride a trend to get rich quickly. Compared to coinbase, square is overvalued by a factor of about 5 (so if coinbase's price stays flat, the price of block should fall by about 80%).

Going to have to disagree with you there.
From what I see square is everywhere¹. Just about every small merchant I have been in lately is using them.
I think between their aggressive CC processing fees and cashapp integration and online ordering included for restaurants and so on they are just grabbing business.
Add in the payroll and banking stuff that they do and I really see them just taking over.

-Dave
¹ Admittedly it's a small everywhere, but all over the place in downstate NY and NYC, southern CT and northern NJ. Which is admittedly all urban / dense suburbia. For all I know they don't exist out of this area.

hugeblack

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I don't know, but if we believe that Bitcoin will change with the efforts of one man, then this means that the currency is still in its infancy and needs more maturity. Jack Dorsey has been subjected to many criticisms of Twitter management, but some of the reasons for his resignation are that he will support Bitcoin according to his method, which may not seem completely centralized .

Overall, we'll see what happens but it's good to see more people who see a future in bitcoin as a currency and not for price.

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Quote from: dkbit98 on December 07, 2021, 08:05:55 AM

They are still in infant early phases for both projects and I don't expect to see anything release for next year or two, but let's wait and see.
I am not sure if he is an ego maniac like Elon Musk, but I don't think he will go down the route of creating his own shitcoin or investing in some crap like Elon.

We'll know if he starts building spaceships, which seems to be a major hint as to the evilness of a billionaire.

Seriously though, I liked Square, it made the otherwise idiotic credit card processing system bearable for a small business, but unfortunately many of those financial startups eventually branch out into predatory lending and shit like that once they go public and need to show exponential revenue growth, and Square is no exception here. So chances are that they will fuck Bitcoin payments up with some contrived fiat-inspired nonsense.

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Quote from: ABCbits on December 07, 2021, 04:12:56 AM

It's not like he compltely remove himself from twitter. He still have twitter shareholders which could used to influence twitter action.

Dorsey has been fighting twitter shareholders for years. He only owns about 2% of twitter, and does not have much influence.

Quote from: noorman0 on December 06, 2021, 10:54:28 AM

With his new brand name, it's clear that Jack wants to focus more on blockchain space. Will Jack be the next person to influence the global economy, especially bitcoin, to rival Elon's influence as the richest man? Keep in mind that Jack is very supportive of bitcoin, and I don't think he's going to create his own version of a new cryptocurrency.

No, he is trying to ride a trend to get rich quickly. Compared to coinbase, square is overvalued by a factor of about 5 (so if coinbase's price stays flat, the price of block should fall by about 80%).

Quote from: ABCbits on December 07, 2021, 04:12:56 AM

Blocks is opening many job vacancies, find your opportunity here. https://block.xyz/careers

I don't think it would be a good idea to work for any company that Dorsey is running (or even is associated with).

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Quote from: noorman0 on December 06, 2021, 10:54:28 AM

With his new brand name, it's clear that Jack wants to focus more on blockchain space. Will Jack be the next person to influence the global economy, especially bitcoin, to rival Elon's influence as the richest man? Keep in mind that Jack is very supportive of bitcoin, and I don't think he's going to create his own version of a new cryptocurrency.

It is well known that Jack and his Blocks (ex square) team is working on Bitcoin decentralized exchange TBdex, and on new cryptocurrency hardware wallet.
They are still in infant early phases for both projects and I don't expect to see anything release for next year or two, but let's wait and see.
I am not sure if he is an ego maniac like Elon Musk, but I don't think he will go down the route of creating his own shitcoin or investing in some crap like Elon.

ABCbits

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It's not like he compltely remove himself from twitter. He still have twitter shareholders which could used to influence twitter action.

Quote from: noorman0 on December 06, 2021, 10:54:28 AM

Blocks is opening many job vacancies, find your opportunity here. https://block.xyz/careers

I can't believe they actually use .xyz rather than .com or .io. For a second i thought you include wrong link.

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I hope I don't sound weird on this but it is interesting how Jack Dorsey explained his resignation from the company he co-founded in 2006. He sounded so Bitcoinish. Apologies for the word. There's just no better way of putting it. Dorsey seems to be doing a Satoshi in saying that Twitter being headed and led by its founder is "severely limiting" and has "a single point of failure." He further said that he had "worked hard to ensure this company can break away from its founding and founders.”^[1] That's what Satoshi did, who also made a somewhat similar pronouncement before leaving for good. And to think that Dorsey is probably leaving Twitter to give more focus on his Bitcoin-related endeavors. The man looks so Bitcoin-inspired.

[1] https://labusinessjournal.com/news/2021/dec/06/twitter-ceo-jack-dorsey-steps-down/

Topic: Jack Dorsey is developing an economic platform (Blocks) (Read 298 times)