Someone Already Took Your Awesome Band Name

You’d think Led Zeppelin great John Paul Jones wouldn’t have trouble finding a name for his new band, but the small world of Internet has allowed even tiny groups to jealously guard their appellations. It seems like every name is taken. “Think of a great band name and Google it, and you'll find a French-Canadian jam band with a MySpace page,” Jones tells the Wall Street Journal. That MySpace page is the problem.

“If 37 people in California logged on to your MySpace page last month, you can argue that you provide goods or services in California” even if you’re a local band across the country, a lawyer says. And that commercial use means you have a right to the name. It didn’t used to be like this, when small groups with the same name toiled in obscurity. But the Internet now allows a quick and heartbreaking search of the millions of names already taken. Jones and his bandmates wanted Caligula. They got Them Crooked Vultures. (More Led Zeppelin stories.)