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London - Simon Cowell came under fire on Wednesday from UK music charity Rhythmix for seeking to trademark the name of the charity for use by a girl-group the entertainment mogul is promoting on the X-Factor music competition.
Rhythmix, a 12-year-old Brighton-based charity that offers music lessons to juvenile offenders and other at-risk youths in southeast England, called on Cowell and his entertainment holdings company, Simco Ltd, to end recent efforts to seek a European trademark for Rhythmix.
"Simon, we are personally asking you to sort this problem out in the quickest and simplest way: Just change the name," Rhythmix Chief Executive Mark Davyd said in an open letter to Cowell published on the Facebook social networking site on Wednesday.
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The Rhythmix charity has served up music programmes and training to 40 000 people since it was created in 1999, according to its website.
Rhythmix is the name taken by a four-member girl band that is among the final 10 contestants on the latest season of Britain's X-Factor television franchise.
No spokesperson for Cowell or SyCo Entertainment, a unit of Sony Music which runs X-Factor in a joint venture with Cowell's company, were immediately available for comment.
Davyd said his organisation was prepared to take legal action if necessary.
"Maybe those young people won't be on your programmes, or your record label, but the music they create is important to them," he wrote on Facebook.
