[August 20, 2009] The Fresno Bee, Calif., Mike Osegueda column: Local music festival gets attention from cable TV Tweet Aug 20, 2009 (The Fresno Bee - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Organizers of the Fresno Urban Sound Experience, an upstart local music festival, hoped their effort would bring attention to Fresno's music scene. It has, but in a different way than they expected. The festival -- often abbreviated as F.U.S.E. -- drew about 500 people to see 20 local bands at three downtown venues on a Saturday last October. By all the accounts, the new festival was a hit and the future looked bright. All was good in F.U.S.E.-land until recently. Plans were under way for a second festival (Oct. 2-3), which would be expanded to two days, with double the bands and twice the venues. Late last month, the F.U.S.E. organizing committee got a letter from Fuse, the cable music channel. It was a cease-and-desist letter, telling the Fresno festival folks that the TV folks didn't think they should be calling their festival F.U.S.E. and that the Web domain they own, fusefest.com -- well, they should give that to Fuse TV too. That said one thing to Matt Schwartz, one of the festival organizers: "We're on the radar." Schwartz, a concert promoter, is part of a team that steers the festival. It also includes a few local musicians and members of Creative Fresno, a nonprofit organization of creative professionals that sponsors the festival. All agree the situation is just about the kindest dispute you could ask for. "We trust that your group has no interest in generating confusion with the Fuse network," read the letter from TV network's lawyer. "We likewise have no interest in causing hardship to a local grass-roots group promoting music in the Fresno area. However, the Fuse trademark is a valuable asset to the network and steps must be taken to eliminate possible confusion." For its part, the F.U.S.E. staff is saying it doesn't want a big fight and is relenting on the name. They're opting instead to be punny and coin this year's festival, as Re:Fuse. The more interesting issue will be the fusefest.com Web domain. There are no plans to just hand it over to the music network. Instead, Creative Fresno chair Travis Sheridan says they're going to give the network the chance to buy the Web address. "The proceeds they provide us will go into the festival to help produce and market the Re:Fuse," he says. "We're almost presenting them an opportunity to be a sponsor this year." And wouldn't that be a friendly end to a very kind, albeit interesting dispute? A sort of win-win for the big cable station and Fresno's music scene. Who knows, maybe Fresno's fest would get on TV. The columnist can be reached at mosegueda @fresnobee.com or (559) 441-6479. Read his blog at fresnobeehive.com. To see more of The Fresno Bee, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.fresnobee.com Copyright (c) 2009, The Fresno Bee, Calif. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email [email protected], call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]