In early June I got a rather unexpected email from Apple’s legal team…
My little watch app WristCheck had come to the attention of a much bigger WristCheck - the folks at wristcheck.com, who had reached out, via Apple, to let me know that they held a Trademark on the name…
Now, before I go any further I want to be really clear that I don’t grudge the WristCheck team for wanting to protect their Trademark - they absolutely have a right to do that and I should have had the sense to check when I created the app!
I’m not going to lie, when I first got the email I was worried that I’d got myself into trouble - the message from Apple was (understandably) very formal, but it did loop in an engineering lead from WristCheck.com and asked me to reach out directly… so I did, and I have to say the team at WristCheck were great and were happy for me to go and try to rebrand the app quickly and get a fresh build out, without pushing me to pause app downloads until it was complete.
The artist formerly known as WristCheck Link to heading
The hardest part of the task was coming up with a new name - I went around the houses a bit before settling on WristTrack (it was only after I’d completed the update that a friend suggested the possibly wonderful ‘WristWatch’…). The actual update wasn’t too bad - whilst I haven’t fully separated out all of the text in the app into separate reference files, there is quite a bit stored that way, so I was able to get most pages updated relatively quickly.
Once the app was updated I sent the app for review by Apple and Google and then reached back out to the WristCheck team who great again - and they were kind enough to send out a little goody bag for me to thank me (which was super nice, when arguably I’m the one who should have been apologising!)
The pack included this great little book called ‘The Magic of Watches’:
Magical!
Gotta love a Speedmaster!
But of course, that wasn’t quite the end of things…
All the other stuff Link to heading
Whilst this initial update was enough to get a renamed app into the stores, it doesn’t give the full picture. Firstly, the first release didn’t get 100% of the ‘WristCheck’ name references out of the app - the name still appeared in some onboarding screenshots, as well as a link to the original wristcheck.app website…
…and on that subject - the website! Once the app was out I registered the new domain wristtrack.app and cancelled the renewal on the old one. Whilst the site is simple, it makes it easy to share a single link which helps people find the app on each platform - it’s also now the home of essential things like the privacy policy, and lets me write up quick release notes for the app (both of which I now keep separate from here).
Finally, there was a need to rebrand my little Instagram account to both point to the new website and show the new app name (as an aside, I’ve updated the links on the other page, but it’s probably clear that whilst I’ve kept the WristTrack instagram account active and updated, the Twitter account is barely touched and I’ve not done much with the Air Fryr insta account… I’m just less interested in taking pictures of food!).
Anyway, that’s my little tale of woe…
Tl;Dr: I picked an app name that I wasn’t allowed to use and ended up having to spend a week updating the app and everything associated with it! Also, the team at wristcheck.com are genuinely great!
Stif out!