sincitydisciple01
Full Fledged Farker
Little bit of a rant here, so my apologies in advance.
I joined KCBS in the summer of 2010. Upon joining, I also registered our team name, Big Iron BBQ. At the time, there were no other teams competing under the same name. Fast forward to summer of 2011. I was looking up our team score on an aggregator and noticed that there were scores from events in California. This caught my eye because we have only competed in Kansas! When i went to the KCBS website to look up the name, I notice that members of the California team were listed in with my team here in KC. I didn't really think much about it and frankly forgot about it. Just assumed it would fix itself.
Then earlier this year while we were reviewing the 2012 competition calendar, a teammate asked aloud "I wonder how we stack up against other teams in Kansas?". Then it hit me. If the guys in California continue to compete, then our scores will be combined and the reporting won't be accurate. Please note, we have no pie in the sky belief that we will dominate or anything silly like that. We are just wanting to see where we stack up as well as how our scores compare to those immediately ahead of and behind us.
I contacted KCBS via email and asked to have our team name modified to "Big Iron BBQ KS" so we could differentiate ourselves from the California crew. No problem. KCBS created a new team and moved all of the KC team members under it.
Here's the problem... In addition to copying over our bio, contact info and logo, they left the same info on the other Big Iron team listing. This may not sound like a big deal, but we own and maintain the logo and all of the web stuff (Facebook, website, twitter etc...). I have absolutely NO reason to believe any of it would be compromised by the California team, but they have no equity in any of it either.
KCBS was clueless on how to remove the logo and bio from the old page. We went as far as to have another teammate join KCBS in an attempt to get them assigned to the California team, so he could modify the profile and remove our content. Ironically, KCBS noticed his address and decided to put him on the Kansas team. This make me wonder why the same diligence wasn't practiced when the California team registered a YEAR after I did?!?
This all may seem silly, but I would guess that in addition to the time and money required to compete, a lot of folks spend a good chunk of time, effort and cash to come up with a logo and develop a web presence.
KCBS is quick to point out that they do not have the legal right to grant exclusive use of any name, trade name or trademark and that's OK with us. But their lack of ability or willingness to manage the database that the members pay to be a part of, is somewhat puzzling and incredibly frustrating.
As of the writing of this rant, there have been 2 phone calls and 5 emails to try and straighten this out. All without success.
I joined KCBS in the summer of 2010. Upon joining, I also registered our team name, Big Iron BBQ. At the time, there were no other teams competing under the same name. Fast forward to summer of 2011. I was looking up our team score on an aggregator and noticed that there were scores from events in California. This caught my eye because we have only competed in Kansas! When i went to the KCBS website to look up the name, I notice that members of the California team were listed in with my team here in KC. I didn't really think much about it and frankly forgot about it. Just assumed it would fix itself.
Then earlier this year while we were reviewing the 2012 competition calendar, a teammate asked aloud "I wonder how we stack up against other teams in Kansas?". Then it hit me. If the guys in California continue to compete, then our scores will be combined and the reporting won't be accurate. Please note, we have no pie in the sky belief that we will dominate or anything silly like that. We are just wanting to see where we stack up as well as how our scores compare to those immediately ahead of and behind us.
I contacted KCBS via email and asked to have our team name modified to "Big Iron BBQ KS" so we could differentiate ourselves from the California crew. No problem. KCBS created a new team and moved all of the KC team members under it.
Here's the problem... In addition to copying over our bio, contact info and logo, they left the same info on the other Big Iron team listing. This may not sound like a big deal, but we own and maintain the logo and all of the web stuff (Facebook, website, twitter etc...). I have absolutely NO reason to believe any of it would be compromised by the California team, but they have no equity in any of it either.
KCBS was clueless on how to remove the logo and bio from the old page. We went as far as to have another teammate join KCBS in an attempt to get them assigned to the California team, so he could modify the profile and remove our content. Ironically, KCBS noticed his address and decided to put him on the Kansas team. This make me wonder why the same diligence wasn't practiced when the California team registered a YEAR after I did?!?
This all may seem silly, but I would guess that in addition to the time and money required to compete, a lot of folks spend a good chunk of time, effort and cash to come up with a logo and develop a web presence.
KCBS is quick to point out that they do not have the legal right to grant exclusive use of any name, trade name or trademark and that's OK with us. But their lack of ability or willingness to manage the database that the members pay to be a part of, is somewhat puzzling and incredibly frustrating.
As of the writing of this rant, there have been 2 phone calls and 5 emails to try and straighten this out. All without success.
