Coinbase gives BUIDL back to the community

Coinbase, one of the biggest exchange platforms around the world, became the talk of the town ever since it was revealed that the company was planning to trademark one of the most popular terms, BUIDL. The response that the company received turned out to be rather unpleasant, with even well-known influencers calling out the exchange platform on this move.

This included Changpeng Zhao, the Founder, and CEO of Binance, popularly known as CZ. The Founder was using the term on several occasions along with other ones such as HODL, and SAFU. When the news regarding the trademark broke out, a Twitterati, Rallyqt claimed that CZ has been using the term and she has not come across a single tweet from Coinbase which included the term.

To which, CZ said:

“lol, that’s hilarious. We focus on real building, not filing. I think I saw HODL somewhere first. I may or may not be the first one to use the BUIDL term. Can’t remember, and not that important. … But if they fk around with #SAFU, I will be pissed!”

This was followed by CZ stating that pissed means “lawyers ready to go”, adding that trademarking terms such as BUIDL, which is widely used in the community hurts the company reputation instead of building it.

Nonetheless, Balaji S. Srinivasan, the CTO of Coinbase, has also stepped in with the intention of clarifying Coinbase’s move. He said on Twitter:

“Saw the commotion on Twitter & dug into this. Coinbase filed the trademark for BUIDL some time back. I learned about it today & chatted with team. TLDR is that @brian_armstrong & I don’t believe in trademarks for stuff like this so we’ll be giving this one back to the community.”

Srinivasan further stated that the company had “no intention” of preventing the cryptocurrency community from using the terms. He also revealed that they had thought of a feature called Coinbase BUIDL and the reason they had made the filing was to avoid “patent trolls” for a common term.

Additionally, Srinivasan stated that BUIDL was first used in one of his talk that go back to April 2015, before he joined Coinbase.

He went on to say:

“But it’s entered the common crypto lexicon at this point and we wouldn’t have it any other way.”

To which, CZ said:

“Great stuff! Respect for using it all the way back in 2015, and for being community driven. Coffee/drinks on me when we meet again. Where was the first use of HODL? Anyone know? “.