It sounds similar enough to me "Let's Encrypt" that it could confuse people. The trademark system is supposed to prevent confusion, which seems to me like what "Start Encrypt" could do. Thus, that also seems to me like a trademark problem.
I tend to disagree (on the latter point). Encrypt is a generic word here. I don't think it's appropriate (nor consistent with the law) to grant broad trademark protection for generic terms.
To me, it's closer to "Joe's Pizza," "Anna's Pizza", and "Arlington Pizza" all selling, well pizza. Could someone confuse Arlington Pizza and Anna's Pizza? Sure, especially if Anna's Pizza is in Arlington and the owner of Arlington Pizza is named Anna. Nevertheless, you can't trademark "<Adjective> Pizza"
"Encrypt" on its own is generic but the "<Imperative-Verb> Encrypt" form of it doesn't sound generic enough to me. Trademarks don't have to be original to be trademarkable, just not cause confusion. I can see people getting confused by "start encrypt" vs "let's encrypt". There could be a case for trademark confusion there.
> Nevertheless, you can't trademark "<Adjective> Pizza"
Yep, you totally can. Again, because originality has got
nothing to do with trademarks:
Absolutely correct that you can trademark those phrases. I thought one thing and typed completely another. My mistake.
What I meant is that you can't use your trademark on "<Adjective> Pizza" to exclude anyone else from registering "<Different Adjective> Pizza" and competing with you [edit: under that mark].
Depends on the adjective. If "Hot Pizza" is granted (it seems to just be an application), which I doubt because that does sound really generic, then probably nobody will be granted "Warm Pizza" or "Sizzling Pizza" because that sounds similar enough to cause confusion.
Likelihood of confusion is the acid test for trademark infringement:
Also, preventing others from competing with you is completely irrelevant to trademarks. That's more something like what patents do. As far as trademarks go, you can compete all you want, just make sure you don't portray yourself as having the same name as your competitor.
You may be right (I'm not well-versed in the trademark system), but at least we can agree that this is a more complicated matter than what Comodo is doing. I mean, there is no plausibility in Comodo's case - just plain evil.
