Check out this picture of a gas station sign. The station owner, oddly, sells SHELL gas AND its own brand (somewhat unusual). In addition to the franchisor/franchisee issues discussed in the law.com article, what we may have here possibly is a rare real-world case of Initial Interest Confusion, where the copying of a mark
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Still More On Linking
Everything about linking from Searchenginewatch.com via Politech.
Perhaps There Should Be TLDs Zoned For Political Speech
Politechbot via ICANNwatch on the case of William Purdy and what looks to be another domain name as free speech case. An anti-abortion advocate is apparently registering what are described as names similar or identical to the names of newspapers. The registrant re-directs traffic to anti-abortion sites.
I disagree with the author’s final sentence, that…
Minority Business RoundTable vs. Minority Business RoundTable
This from the Washington Post about two groups fighting over the name Minority Business RoundTable. Trademark disputes are not limited to for-profit enterprises.
Brand As Navigator continued: Paid Search
From cnn.com via slashdot.org re: paid search engines’ tardiness in complying with the FTC order in revealing how payment affects search placement.
Gator Enjoined Over Pop-up Advertising
Quick injunction received against Gator, pop-up ad specialist, by major media companies, according to ZDNet wire.
Parents Group Apologizes to WWE over 'Wrestling Death' case remarks
Nothing to do with trademarks but interesting. A Florida teenager was convicted of the 1999 murder of a young girl. It was widely reported that death was caused by the boy imitating wrestling moves, and the case was widely referred to as the wrestling death case. The Parents Television Council made the wrestling death case a feature…
Proof of Secondary Meaning That It Is Really For Us, By Us
FUBU (its founders using the acronym of “For US, By Us”), sells clothing under the 05 mark, where the 05 is depicted as a numeral on a sports jersey. It turns out that pro athletes (Gretzky being the exception) don’t use numbers starting with a 0, so FUBU was able to build some distinctiveness in the number. A…
The Trademark Implications of Spoofing Music Downloads – Self-Tarnishment?
Thursday’s Wall Street Journal has an article on “spoofed songs” on file-sharing services such as Morpheus or Kazaa. The article suggests that the record companies are now uploading defective versions of their own songs (3 minutes of static for example), so as to frustrate users from utilizing the free services. The “major record labels neither…
And Her Last Hit Record was in 1975
Janis Ian on how she makes more money because of downloading, via Slashdot.org.