Mental Muscles

Archive for the ‘The Way Of The Law’ Category

To even mention the name of this government institution can set off waves of anxiety and stories of abuse and persecution that is unheard of for virtually any other governmental body in this country.  It’s really amazing the ability of three little words to instill fear in the hearts of an American citizen when those three little words are – Internal Revenue Service.

When we look a little closer at the mission of the IRS and their actual record of how they handle most of their cases, the level of hysteria we get ourselves into is really pretty silly.  For the most part, the abuses and draconian methods that we think of when we talk about the IRS are urban myth.  You would think that the IRS existed solely to imprison the American people, take all of their property and make our lives miserable either through audits that resemble the Spanish Inquisition or by keeping us all in constant terror.

This is not to say that over the decades there have not been some abuses that have earned the IRS as least some of the reputation it is still working to live down.  Yes, you can dig back and find some pretty awful abuses that the IRS has committed against citizens in the name of tax collection.  But to be fair, we can find abuses in many governmental bodies, particularly those with a mission to carry out that is undercover or violent.  We can think of phenomenal stories of violence and unethical behavior by the ATF, The FBI, The CIA and all branches of the military.  But we don’t as a population cringe in terror in talking about those governmental bodies the way we do when the subject of the IRS comes up in conversation.

You have to wonder why the IRS strikes such fear into our hearts.  Part of it is the influence of the media, Hollywood and television.  The IRS makes a big target and many times the role of an IRS agent is depicted in movies as a heartless mercenary out to take away everything you own.  The specter of an IRS audit is feared with the same loathing of a root canal or torture by foreign spies.

But much of it may come from just a plain and simple distain for paying taxes.  We just don’t like the idea of the government taking our money.  The cure for this is to step back and examine why taxes are necessary and understand that paying for the operation of a governmental system is the responsibility of all of us.  It is not only the patriotic thing to do but it is part of what being a citizen of a great nation does.  The IRS are just the clerks assigned with the difficult task of making sure everybody pays their taxes.  And, after all, the system is only fair if everybody pays their share.

The truth is that the IRS does all it can not to have to resort to drastic measures to help each citizen participate in the support of the government equally.  Many times even the dreaded IRS audit is really no more painful or difficult than getting a bill from your electric company.

It really isn’t the IRS’s fault that the tax laws are complicated and hard to figure out.  If we want to fix that, we should go to our congressmen and elected officials.  The IRS is really in the same boat we are in.  They have to figure out the tax laws and then see to it that we live within them.  Blaming the IRS because we don’t like the tax laws or paying taxes in general is the old “bad news, kill the messenger” syndrome.

If we take a more reasonable view of what the IRS is and that they are doing their best, as we all are, to get a job done that not very many people like, we might not only stop fearing and despising them, we might see them as just another governmental body that has to be there just like the military at the federal level and the garbage man or the school board chairman at the local level.  These are just good honest Americans doing their best to make the system work.  And if we work together, it can work and we can find ways to make it better.

In the world of the internet, there are a lot of strange new ideas and words.  If you have taken that step of setting up your own web page, you already know what a “domain” is.  Basically a domain is that phrase used to find you on the internet.  For example, if you set up a web page to see your modern art, you can create a name like, joesmodernart.com and people can find you on the internet that way.  So in this example, joesmodernart.com is your “domain name”.

For the internet to work, though, only one person or business can have joesmodernart.com for their domain name.  That unique name is like your phone number online.  Anyone, anywhere in the world that goes to their browser and keys in www.joesmodern.art.com will find your site on the internet.  So to keep things orderly, domain names are sold on a first come first serve basis.

But the problem comes when someone learns to abuse the system.  The internet and setting up web pages has become big business.  So, as with any situation where there is money to be made or a crime to be committed, the internet has attracted it’s share of criminals and people who want to take advantage of honest people.

In the case of domain names, the crime that has causes endless grief for legitimate web site owners is called “cyber squatting”.  Cyber squatters take advantage of the fact that there are ways to “steal” someone’s domain name.  The idea is to hijack someone’s domain name so they have to buy it back from the squatter.  That approach is similar to a hostage situation.  There are many variations on the cyber squatter formula for stealing commerce from good honest internet businesses including…

*    Setting up a parallel business so people think they are buying from a trusted company but they are actually giving money to a criminal operation who will not honor the purchase.
*    Setting up an alternate business to hurt the original owner of the domain.  For example, if someone is disgruntled at their local bank because they got turned down for a loan, if they can cyber squat on the bank’s domain name, they can create an “I hate XYZ bank” web site to hurt the bank’s credibility with their good customers.
*    Jumping in during the short period of time when the domain name needs to be renewed and gaining ownership over it.  Domain names are generally for a specified period of time of a year, three years, etc.  So if you don’t pay your renewal, that name can become the property of someone else.  If a cyber squatter steals that name away during the renewal period, they can hold you hostage to get that valuable name back.

There are even notable cases where criminals divert traffic to pornography sites by cyber squatting on a legitimate business site.  Another clever ploy of cyber squatters is to purchase your exact same domain name with a different extension.  So if you own joesmodernart.com, a cyber squatter might buy joesmodernart.net, joesmodernart.biz, joesmodernart.gov and any of the other popular extensions.  By building a site out there under your domain name with an alternate extension, they can draw traffic to that bogus site and hijack your visitors, the traffic you would be getting and maybe even the revenue from sales that you can expect because your web site is well known for quality goods or services.

This problem has become so wide spread that congress has stepped in and put some laws on the books to help out legitimate web site owners.  The strongest law on the books is called the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act or the ACPA for short.  This law gives you some muscle you can use to bring a lawsuit against anyone who is using cyber squatting to hijack all the hard work you have put in to build that web site.

You will need some legal help to take this law and use it to protect your rights.  But like anything else, your domain name and your cyberspace “property” has a value to you.  So if someone is using some internet trickery to “squat” on your domain name, it is worth your while to defend it.

Launching a new business is both an exciting and scary adventure for even a seasoned business veteran.  But there is something about the spirit of the entrepreneur that drives us to strike out on our own and do something new, despite the risks.

You will have a lot to think about but if you get good help, you have a good shot at success.  Of course you need financing, good accounting and legal help and a solid business plan.  You need a product that serves a documented market need and a marketing plan that gets that product into the hands of that needy market efficiently and quickly so you can cash in on your business concept.

The legal side of things is probably the most intimidating aspect of a new business venture.  Of the numerous issues that we need to be concerned out, one that often escapes notice is the simple act of choosing a business name.

This side of creating a new business is often the most exciting for the novice entrepreneur.  By creating a name that is short but still does a good job of getting across the mission of the business is a challenge.  But it is a labor of love for the owner or owners of the business to be.  Often integrating the names of the owners or names of loved ones serves the business well.  Certainly that can be said of McDonalds, Wendy’s and Denny’s.

But there are some legal issues to be considered when picking that name that is going to become your corporate identity to the world.  That business name is going to show up on your business card, your web page, at your corporate headquarters, in your advertising if that is appropriate and many other places.  It will be how the world references your business.  You want to be proud of it for sure.  But even more than that, it is important that name belongs to you.

The legal arena covering business names falls under the category of trademark law.  The problem comes up if you happen to pick a business name that could possibly be the same name of a competitor in your field.  This is not just a concern for your local community.  If you are using the same name as someone on the other side of the country or even on the other side of the world, technically you can run into problems if that business decides to call you out about it.

Stories abound of how a big powerful company took issue with some small mom and pop business who happened to have the same name and used all of their mighty legal muscle to force someone to change their business name, maybe even abandoning their own family name because it was covered by the trademark claims of the larger firm.  While these stories are sad to be sure, the fact remains, the law is the law.  So it’s a good idea to make sure that this name you are about to create will be yours day one, in five years and even down the road when and if your business becomes a large international success.

So even though going through yet another legal process and employing yet another lawyer to run up yet another legal bill seems to be a burden, its necessary to make sure your business name belongs to you.  The good thing is that trademark lawyers know their stuff and should be able to do a trademark search fairly easily to let you know if there is any reason for concern.  Once you get that green light from your legal help, then you can proudly launch that name as your business knowing you covered your bases.