> Brands at least start out as a designation of quality, but in modern society, they're an important part in companies avoiding legal liability, and having more distributed supply chains.
This isn't brand; this is legal company structure. Brand is "what people think of when they hear the word Nike".
I suppose we're just disagreeing on definition here - but I'd at least try to make the case that if people having a single thing they think of when they hear the word Nike, is necessary for a company to be able to structure itself that way legally.
Otherwise, individual manufacturing companies, don't have the financial incentive to give companies like Nike as big a portion of the profits as they do. Currently that system works, because the brand association of "Nike" gives people some kind of status/quality-assurance/whatever that they are happy to pay for.
I think you have a different understanding of what exactly a brand is than do most people. Every profession has the right to develop its own jargon that subtly redefines common words in its own way so I'm not going to say that you're wrong about what "brand" means in any absolute way, just that you're wrong to say that pg is wrong.
Fair enough - although I'd add in my defense that my take wasn't "Paul Graham is wrong", in fact I really liked the essay and agreed with a lot of it. It was more that I think there's a lot more going on with brands than the essay makes out (although you might disagree with this take too)
This isn't brand; this is legal company structure. Brand is "what people think of when they hear the word Nike".