Logitech’s Streamalabs came under the scanner of the internet after OBS tweeted out saying that the brand is plagiarising on its brand without permission and creating confusion among customers.
OBS Project, also known as the Open Broadcaster Software is one of the first and the only open-source platform. OBS was launched in 2012 and has been the backbone of many other streaming platforms. Whereas, Streamlabs is a private brand wholly owned by Logitech.
OBS alleged that Streamlabs had used their brand name even after the OBS team had prohibited them from using its name in any service. OBS tried to seek out this matter in private before but the Streamlabs team was uncooperative and even trademarked the “SLOBS” name.
OBS also explained yesterday how the use of its name in Streamlabs’ “SLOBS” has caused problems over the years for support volunteers.
“We’re often faced with confused users and even companies who do not understand the difference between the two apps. We’ve had interactions with several companies who did not realize our apps were separate.” – said OBS on Twitter.
Partnered streamers also called out Streamlabs and asked them to rectify the allegations as soon as possible. Most notably, Pokimane threatened to drop the service in favor of another donation service.
Another Twitch partner, Anne Munition admitted that the names were confusing and she always thought OBS and Streamlabs had a partnered service.
“I thought SLOBS was a collaborative project between OBS and SL, I had no idea they just used the name against your wishes…”– Anne Munition said on Twitter.
Streamlabs issued a public apology to OBS and said that they are immediately going to remove “OBS” from its name and take responsibility for its actions.
But copying OBS’s name isn’t the only time when Streamlabs had copied over other works. Livestream, a cloud-based livestreaming service also alleged Streamlabs of plagiarizing its website layout and design.
To this Streamlabs issued an apology and said that the text was a “placeholder” that went into production by error. They removed the text as soon as it was spotted and updated the site to the intended version.
