The Daily Beast
MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell is trying to launch a social media site and this has already resulted in a legal threat
Stephen Maturen / Getty ImagesMyPillow Trump’s founding and faithful ally, Mike Lindell, plans to launch his own social network in the coming weeks, creating a haven for the kind of pro-Trump conspiracy theories that have been banned on major social media sites. On Lindell’s “Vocl” social media platform, users will be free to claim that a supercomputer stole Donald Trump’s election or that vaccines are a tool of the devil. Any new social media network faces serious challenges. But Vocl must face a frightening problem even before it is launched: a website called “Vocal”, written with an “A”, already exists. On Thursday, lawyers for Vocal’s publicly held parent company, Creatd, Inc., warned Lindell, in a revised letter by The Daily Beast, to change the name of its social media network and renounce ownership of the name of Vocl.com domain. If Lindell refuses to change the name, he could face a lawsuit. While Lindell promised to turn Vocl into a “cross between Twitter and YouTube”, Vocal is a publishing platform similar to Medium where writers can post and monetize articles. of course you are acting in bad faith and with the intention of profiting from the Creatd brand, “says the letter, claiming that Lindell’s Vocl would” stain “the Vocal brand.” It’s not like anything you’ve ever seen, “Lindell he previously told Insider, describing his social network with a similar name. “It’s all about being able to be vocal again and not step on eggs.” Creatd has the trademark for using “Vocal” in a number of ways related to social networks, including the creation of “virtual communities” and “online network services. ”Along with disclaiming ownership of the Vocl.com domain name, Creatd wants Lindell to destroy all Vocl branded products and never use the name again. “Creatd is prepared to take all necessary measures to protect Creatd’s valuable intellectual property rights, without prior notice to you,” said the letter. When asked on Friday morning about the new legal notice, the energetic CEO of MyPillow and Trump’s friend replied: “It has nothing to do with your trademark. I haven’t even released it yet. But it has nothing to do with us. “Lindell says Vocl is also an acronym.” Ours means ‘Victory of the Love of Christ’, “added Lindell. , he called back to say, “We investigated and we believe it would be confusing, so we will announce a different name and URL on Monday.” Lindell is already facing a major process. In February, voting technology company Voting Systems sued Lindell and MyPillow for their baseless allegations that Dominion was involved in an outrageous electoral theft. At the same time, Lindell, with the help of Trump’s lawyer and Gawkers killer Charles Harder, also recently sued the tabloid Daily Mail over the January article in the publication that Trump’s friend had a “secret romance” with Jane 30 Rock and Unbreakable star Kimmy Schmidt Krakowski, a story that both parties categorically denied. For years, the pillow mogul was a personal friend of former President Donald Trump and a staunch supporter and activist of MAGA. During the 2020 presidential election, Lindell served as co-chairman of Trump 2020 in Minnesota, and after Trump’s defeat at the Electoral College and the general election for Democrat Joe Biden, the CEO of MyPillow became one of the country’s highest voices supporting Trump’s broader effort to overturn the outcome of the presidential race. (Trump’s undemocratic crusade over this, of course, culminated in his instigation of the deadly January 6 riot at the United States Capitol in Washington, DC, an event that led to the former impeachment’s second impeachment in the House.) Tumultuous period presidential transition, Lindell was a big backer behind various efforts to challenge the 2020 results, and towards the end of Trump’s term he even visited the then president at the White House to inform him of discredited documents claiming that China and other foreign nations helped to hack the election and launch it to Biden. Since the beginning of the Biden era, Lindell has not given up aggressively promoting the fiction that Trump really won, even though it has resulted in his banning certain social media platforms, his business being shunned by other companies and increasing legal risk. Alternative social media networks aimed at conservatives have been challenged by hacks and other technical problems, but Lindell says Vocl will not face these problems. Hackers recently hit the far-right social network Gab, while the social media platform Parler went offline for a month after the United States Capitol riot when Amazon Web Services withdrew support for its hosting. In contrast, Lindell told Insider that Vocl will have its own servers, with “space-age stuff” to prevent hackers. Lindell told Insider that Vocl has a team of about 10 people, but declined to describe them or where they are working “for your safety.” Vocl users will be free to promote conspiracy theories about electoral fraud and vaccines, according to a speech Lindell gave on Wednesday at an Arizona rally. “Every word that comes out of their mouths will say Dominion, Smartmatic fraud, vaccine fraud,” Lindell said to the excited crowd, describing the content on Vocl. Read more at The Daily Beast. Have a tip? 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