August 2004

Interesting page of domain name statistics, via ZookNic.  .INFO and .BIZ peaked in September 2003 (approximately two years after their roll-outs). .COM has recovered and is at an all-time high in registrations.

MGM et. al. v. Grokster, 03-55894 (9th Cir. August 19, 2004).  Partial dismissal on summary judgment of plaintiff’s copyright infringement claims against Grokster based on contributory and vicarious infringement arising from Grokster’s peer-to-peer software, affirmed by 9th Circuit.

UPDATE: Much commentary on Grokster here.

Interesting depiction of the iPod by FREEDOMOFMUSICCHOICE.ORG, which acknowledges that it is sponsored by Real Networks, a competitor of Apple and iTunes.

Assuming that the depiction of the iPod functioned as a trademark, is this fact pattern reminiscent of that of Deere v. MTD, where a competitor was taken to task (under pre-FTDA

Would you believe that Colin Powell signs off on some of my clients’ non-U.S. trademark applications?  I have his robo-signature in my files.  He certifies the authenticity of the seal of a state’s secretary of state, who authenticates the seal of the county clerk who certified the authenticity of the notarial certificate in the name of my

Google legal department should probably take the rest of August off.  There’s GOOGLES and FROOGLE and GMAIL. 

The GMAIL thing is interesting.  The press release announcing Google’s email service is dated April 1, however media broke the news on March 31.  One company, Cencourse, filed a trademark application for GMAIL for email services