Facebook Sues Teachbook Over Trademark Concerns; Where's Legalbook?
from the generic-plus-book dept
OG was the first of a whole bunch of you to send in the story of social networking giant Facebook suing the tiny Teachbook site, which apparently only has two employees and hasn't even launched yet. The concern, of course, is with the whole "book" ending. Even though Facebook took its name from the very commonly used "facebook" name given to the collections of photos handed out to incoming students at many colleges, it now feels that its name has become more closely connected with social networking. And it's afraid that anyone else using "book" as a suffix for a social networking site could lead to its own name being considered generic."The 'book' component of the Facebook mark has no descriptive meaning and is arbitrary and highly distinctive in the context of online communities and networking Web sites," the complaint explains. "If others could freely use 'generic plus BOOK' marks for online networking services targeted to that particular generic category of individuals, the suffix 'book' could become a generic term for 'online community/networking services' or 'social networking services.' That would dilute the distinctiveness of the Facebook marks, impairing their ability to function as unique and distinctive identifiers of Facebook's goods and services."This isn't quite to the level (as some people are claiming) of Facebook claiming to own the word "book," but it does seem like a stretch. It's one of the many problems seen with the gradual broadening of trademark law to include such concepts as "dilution," rather than sticking to the basic "likelihood of confusion," standard. Whining about companies copying the suffix of your name seems pretty excessive. The tech world is littered with examples of certain prefixes and suffixes suddenly becoming popular among a number of companies after one becomes successful -- and it's never been a real problem for the original brand. Think of how many companies ended in "-ster" after "Napster," and how many companies copied Flickr in ending with an "r" and a dropped vowel.
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Filed Under: book, social networks, trademark
Companies: facebook, teachbook
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I know this was a joke, but the lawyer version is called "Casebook".
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Invalidate their trademark?
Of course you have to have the money to fight it so he who has the gold makes the rules.
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Re: Invalidate their trademark?
Bottom line is when you say Facebook, people know what company you're talking about, so it's serving the source-identified function that is key to trademarks.
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Basically, the closer the relation between the mark and the product/service, the weaker the mark, ranging from generic terms that cannot serve as trademarks ("Apple" for apples), to descriptive terms that can only serve as trademarks if you show they have come to be associated with the proprietor (e.g., "Crispy" for apples), suggestive marks that only vaguely suggest something about the products/services (e.g., "nature-ripe" or something for apples), to fanciful/arbitrary terms that have nothing to do with the goods/services (e.g., "trout" or "zakbor" for apples).
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Facebook
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What about "...soft"
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Re: What about "...soft"
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Like, Microsoft Office vs Open Office?
Neither of them provide office supplies but do provide the same type of product.
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I think you forgot THE example: iThingies
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Facebook v. Teachbook
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So...`
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Both are "Tube" != "Video" sites which is similar to the "book" ~= "social networking" argument.
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WordPerfect used to do this all the time.
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oh noes
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Facebook the bully
Pure BS. They think nobody can tell the differnce between a Comsumer Electronic store and an Auto Parts store.
I guess Glass stores can't sell windows anymore because that belongs to Microsoft.
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Not done yet.
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YouTube?
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www.phonebook.com
www.plantsbook.com
www.animalbook.com
www.boysbook.com
www.girlsbook.com
www.sexbook.com
www.gaybook.com
www.lesbobook.com
www.murderbook.com
Should I continue?
Even the most notorious words with book.com appended to it exist as web address. (www.f***book.com, www.h***ybook.com, etc.)
What does facebook complain about?
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