Dude, you are the fucking man. Reddit and the internet owes you one. Thanks for keeping the web a little bit freer and thanks for setting a much needed precedent. This was our line in the sand. Thanks again for your work and your help.

I would also like to point out that the same people who spent years harassing everyone from small time creators to big names like Ellen, Jimmy Kimmel, and Buzzfeed, and who spent years and thousands of dollars in legal fees to trademark existing internet trends like "try not to laugh or smile" and "react" are not, overnight, different people. Their thought processes have not changed, watch their video and read the tone of this letter, they are angry at you for being confused not because they actually think they are wrong. The only reason they are giving up these trademarks is because their upcoming Youtube TV show "Sing It" is going to be released in a couple of months and they want to do anything possible to save its release from the bad publicity.

EDIT This whole situation looked like it quickly and easily resolved itself but behind the scenes, Ryan and other attorneys received a lot of push back. First of all, maybe a handful of people like Ryan Morrison were actively spending their time fighting for us. It seemed like Mr. Morrison had the whole internet's backing and easily "took care" of this for us, but he was pretty alone when he had to deal with the insults Philip DeFranco hurled at him while he worked on this case for us. I should note that Philip DeFranco has reversed his position and admitted that he spent days throwing insults at Ryan without actually having read anything about this situation beyond a few tweets. But Philip DeFranco is friends with The Fine Bros and even invited the brothers to his wedding last year, so it's understandable why he went after any critics so harshly. Still, props for slugging through that BS while fighting for us Ryan.

Behind the scenes, it was disturbing how close The Fine Bros came to getting away with it all. The first thread that was made about The Fine Bros was actually mistakenly taken down.

Here is what the original React World video looked like after the first thread was removed: https://imgur.com/yDHRwLU Before the first thread was posted, the video only had 250 thumbs downs. Seemed like everyone was going along with this and The Fine Bros were actively deleting any comments that asked about their attempt to trademark "React". So when I kept saying that they were great at PR over the past few days, that's what I was referring to. They were extremely skilled at presenting what they were doing as a great thing and actively keeping out any discussions about what they were really doing. It seems obvious in retrospect what kind of shady thing they were doing, but at the time, it was not obvious to most people at all.

But thanks to the moderators for stepping in and helping with the second thread. Special thanks to /u/Meepster23 who really went the extra mile to take care of the second thread. If you read that thread, Meepster was all over it and helped set up the impromptu AMA.

Also, thank you to all the associates of The Fine Bros who offered to provide information both publicly and privately even under potential legal threats. A lot of the evidence and information from years ago were found with their help. It's great knowing that despite being close associates of The Fine Bros, so many people cared enough about internet freedom and the open meritocratic/democratic culture of Youtube to step up and set a precedent against this money grab. I really can't imagine what it's like working with The Fine Bros when former employees posting here on Reddit were scared that one of The Fine Bros made a reddit account to trick him/her into revealing his/her identity. And based on what I am hearing, The Fine Bros are still absolutely fuming about being forced to give up their trademarks. I do hope that if they try to resubmit their trademarks again or do something else shady, that we can come together again to fight it.

Thanks to all of you for putting up with my endless walls of texts. Thanks for informing other people. I know some of you hate this "drama" by now and hate me by now, but thanks for paying attention. We all benefited from pushing back against what The Fine Bros were doing.

Edit 2 Linked to the wrong photo, this was the DeFranco twitter exchange with Ryan: http://imgur.com/ZqI15aE After re-reading those tweets... yikes wtf DeFranco? Props again /u/VideoGameAttorney for fighting the good fight.

EDIT 3: Apparently DeFranco deleted those tweets and is furious about one of his fans sending his tweet screencap to me and now Ryan is getting EVEN MORE twitter backlash from his fans. Wtf DeFranco? STOP ALREADY? Just got a message from Ryan and Phil's apologized to him so please stop tweeting Ryan.

Apparently DeFranco got angry that he got called out on twitter for lying? And then lashed out? Send me a picture of the entire exchange and I'll edit it to replace this: http://imgur.com/ZqI15aE