Clarksvillian Keith Bassett has hired an attorney to file to trademark the name of a Facebook group he created, “Clarksville Chat”, in an attempt to get a competing group Clarksville Chat group, managed by Jeff Janes, removed from the platform. Bassett says he wants to “garnish the wages” of the competing Facebook group owner and sent Scoop: Clarksville photos of a Samsung flip-phone with purported messages with his attorney.
Keith Bassett, the creator of the Facebook group with 43K followers under the title “Clarksville Chat,” has paid $1,500 to a lawyer in an attempt to trademark its name. He announced in a post he made on Saturday, “After all said in done nobody will be able to use the word Clarksville Chat or Logo saying Clarksville Chat.”[sic]
Keith also messaged Jason Steen, stating “Working on a Trademark for clarksville chat so that Fake clarksville chat that says official will be shut down and anybody else that uses it.”[sic] The group mentioned is under the name “Clarksville Chat – *OFFICIAL*” that has 31,000 followers and is owned by Jeff Janes. Keith believes Jeff copied his creation and stated under a comment “first step is to sue jeff Jane’s and hes group hes gonna have to come up with a whole different group for copying mine and putting official”[sic]
Bassett told Scoop: Clarksville that the end result would be to garnish the wages of Jeff Janes for using his yet received trademark, which isn’t something any lawyer would confirm was even a remote possibility in a list of outcomes of this case. No lawyer we spoke with believed a trademark could ever be granted in this use case scenario.
He later deleted the announcement he made after backlash in the comments. Jeff changed his group name to “Clarksville Chat – *OFFICIAL* (TM)” and matched the cover photo to the one in “Clarksville Chat.”
A trademark is traditionally only granted to businesses that sell good or services (a ‘trade’), and not granted in situations such as this. The legal agreement between Keith Bassett and his lawyer states the money is due, whether or not he is successful in the application. Bassett doesn’t currently use the ‘trade’ name of ‘Clarksville Chat’ for any good or services.
Keith Bassett responded to a request for comment just before press time, saying:
“I didn’t see anything wrong with a trademark for something I created, that’s all”. When asked about paying for the attorney, he says “I gave my stepmom the money to pay it since she has a Paypal…”. He also stated that he will take Jeff Janes to court and “garnish his wages” if he wins the lawsuit.
Keith Bassett Conversation 
Keith Bassett Conversation 
Keith Bassett Conversation 
Keith Bassett Texts 
