Search Engine Liability for Selling Keywords Redux–800-JR Cigar v. GoTo.com
…look at some details. Trademark Infringement Closely following the GEICO v. Google precedent, the court says that GoTo’s sale of keywords constituted a trademark use in commerce. Specifically, the court…
Google Avoids Another Lawsuit Over Rankings (For Now)–Roberts v. Google
…do a markedly inferior job of producing useful search results than search engines will do guided by marketplace forces. Therefore, these lawsuits over search engine rankings pose risk not only…
O’Reilly and the “Web 2.0” Trademark
…the collective guffaw when the original Napster sued to enforce its trademark rights in 2000/2001. It’s not that Napster didn’t have protectable trademark rights (it did), it was just the…
Merck v. Mediplan Redux–Keyword Purchases Really Aren’t Trademark Use
…displays, or associated documents, nor do they use the marks to indicate source or sponsorship….This internal use of the keyword ‘Zocor’ is not use of the mark in the trademark…
Competitor’s Keyword Ad Purchase May Be Trademark Infringement–Edina Realty v. TheMLSonline
…first solid data point (in the US) that buying competitors’ trademarks as keywords, without more, could constitute trademark infringement. This could permanently reduce the market size for keyword ad sales….
Barrett on Internet Trademark Use
…often failed to focus on the appropriate role of the “trademark use” requirement, which has traditionally limited the scope of the trademark infringement (and more recently, trademark dilution) cause of…
Top Cyberspace IP Cases of 2005
…settlement have not been publicly reported. 5. Making a Mark – Patent Marking Statute Applies To Websites A pair of patent cases illustrates how the traditional patent concept of “marking”…
BitTorrent to Enforce BITTORRENT Trademark
…trademark rights in BITTORRENT against software developers who make unauthorized use of the mark in their branding and marketing. Those who want to use the mark will need to gain…
Metatags as Per Se Trademark Infringement–Tdata v. Aircraft Technical Publishers
…company’s mark in metatags constitutes infringing use of the mark to pull consumers to Tdata’s website and the products it features, even if the consumers later realize the confusion.” The…
Anti-Marketing Laws and the Commercial Speech Doctrine
By Eric Goldman Prompted by the Supreme Court’s denial of cert in the White Buffalo case, Chris Hoofnagle of EPIC posted a nice rundown of some recent cases where anti-marketing…