New Facebook URLs and Your Trademarks

Tonight at 12:01 am EST, Facebook will finally be offering vanity urls as a new feature. This has been available for quite some time with other social networks such as LinkedIn and MySpace, but this is the first time it has been a part of Facebook. What this means is that users may select a vanity username for their url rather than a long alphanumeric string. There is more information available directly from Facebook here and here.

What does this mean to merchants? If you have a fan page that had over 1,000 fans as of May 31, 2009, you are fine and will be able to register your username at 12:01pm EST just like all the other Facebook users who had accounts prior to that date. If your fan page has less than 1,000 fans or was registered after May 31, 2009, it looks like you’ll have to wait until June 28, 2009. To keep people from registering actual trademarks as these new usernames however, Facebook has added a new form to help actual trademark owner prevent these types of registrations: Trademark Registration.

Did someone already take your brand? Fill out the Notice of Intellectual Property Infringement form to get started on getting it back.

Facebook has also provided a great FAQ as well that answers most questions. Be sure to register your username tonight or register your trademarks with Facebook today so they are protected, the sooner the better!