Re: Leica Optical Web site

[Fred Ward <fward@erols.com>]

Of course any company can call its products anything it wants, as long 
as the names do not conflict with others who already have rights to 
those names. 

That was not the point. In fact, I am mystified that there should have 
been that confusion about my original message. 

I too think the point was missed.

My comment about the Leica Optical Web site was directed at a corporate 
direction I would rather not see. If the company wants to use the Leica 
name and logo, I am sure it has the legal right to do it. But it does 
appear to me to be trading on the only recognizable and respected name 
the company owns and attempting to transfer the grand tradition and 
respect and value that the LEICA name has enjoyed and demeaning it by 
putting the LEICA brand name on refractometers and surveying gear and 
who knows what else. 

The value, recognition, and historical place that Leica had had will not 
likely be enhanced by this move. Microscopes and binoculars perhaps, and 
even enlargers and projectors, but all the rest, I wish not. 

That was what I meant by my comment. Nothing more, nothing less. 

Fred Ward