Google Defeats Trademark Challenge to Its AdWords Service–Jurin v. Google (Forbes Cross-Post)
By Eric Goldman Jurin v. Google, Inc., 2012 WL 5011007 (E.D. Cal. October 17, 2012). Google ($GOOG) makes billions of dollars a year selling AdWords ads triggered by third party trademarks. Over the past decade, trademark owners have brought about 20…
Newly Released Consumer Survey Indicates that Legal Concerns About Competitive Keyword Advertising Are Overblown (Forbes Cross-Post)
By Eric Goldman Competitive keyword advertising—buying ads triggered by a keyword search for a competitor’s trademarks at venues like Google AdWords, Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing—has generated enormous legal angst over the past decade, including hundreds of law review articles, occasional…
Why Did Google Flip-Flop On Cracking Down On “Rogue” Websites? Some Troubling Possibilities (Forbes Cross-Post)
By Eric Goldman Earlier this month, Google announced that it may downgrade search results for a website if Google receives a high volume of “valid” takedown notices against the website. Google’s move has confused many Google-watchers, largely because the exact…
Breastfeeding Mom Can Sue Video Producer Despite Signing a Blanket Release–Sahoury v. Meredith
By Eric Goldman Sahoury v. Meredith Corp., 2:11-cv-05180-KSH-PS (D. N.J. Aug. 2, 2012) Sahoury consented to being video-recorded while breastfeeding for inclusion in an instructional video. She claims that the video producers orally agreed to two conditions: (1) the instructional…
Google Sued Again for AdWords Trademark Infringement–Home Decor Center v. Google
By Eric Goldman Home Decor Center v. Google, CV12-05706 (C.D. Cal. notice of removal filed July 2, 2012) After the 4th Circuit’s Rosetta Stone v. Google ruling, I wrote: Just like Google got hit with over a dozen lawsuits in…
H1 2012 Quick Links, Part 4 (Search Engines, eBay, Social Networking Sites)
By Eric Goldman [Note: if you click on any of the Scribd links below and get a warning that you’re accessing adult content, ignore that. In only the latest of Scribd’s f-ups, it has deployed a massively overinclusive adult content…
Wisconsin Appeals Court Punts on the Legality of Buying People’s Names for Keyword Advertising–Habush v. Cannon
By Eric Goldman Habush v. Cannon, 2012 WL 2345137 (Wis. App. Ct. June 21, 2012). The case record. My prior blog post on this case. You may recall this case. Habush Habush & Rottier and Cannon & Dunphy are both…
CYBERsitter Sues Google for AdWords Trademark Infringement
By Eric Goldman CYBERsitter LLC v. Google, Inc., CV12-5293 (C.D. Cal. complaint filed June 18, 2012) CYBERsitter competes with Net Nanny and ContentWatch (apparently both owned by the same entity, ContentWatch) in the Internet filtering software niche. CYBERsitter claims ContentWatch…
More Evidence That the Initial Interest Confusion Doctrine is Dying–Dwyer v. Sensocon
By Eric Goldman Dwyer Instruments, Inc. v. Sensocon, Inc., 2012 WL 2049921 (N.D. Ind. June 5, 2012) Earlier this year, I blogged about some research I had done suggesting the declining fortunes of the initial interest confusion doctrine. I anticipated…
Trademark Registrant Isn’t Required to Shut Down Competitive Keyword Advertisers–STK v. Backrack
By Eric Goldman STK LLC v. Backrack, Inc., Cancellation No. 92049332, 2012 WL 2024459 (TTAB May 21, 2012). The TTAB designated this opinion “non-precedential,” which they do with the vast majority of their opinions. Deborah Gerhardt, Leah Chan Grinvald and…