Dismissal Of Google Trademark Case
The suit argued Google abuses trademarks by allowing rivals of a company to buy ads that appear when consumers search for info on that same company.
A U.S. judge is considering whether to dismiss a lawsuit against Google that argues it abuses trademarks by allowing rivals of a company to buy ads that appear when consumers search the Web for information on that company.
Judge Jeremy Vogel of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California said Friday he would make a decision by the end of March on the suit, which was filed in 2003 by American Blind & Wallpaper Factory Inc., the top U.S. reseller of window blinds.
The thing I am struggling with is that I am not dealing with a clean slate.
- Judge Jeremy Vogel
Web search leader Google has prevailed in two prior trademark suits filed against its pay-per-click ads.
Auto insurer GEICO lost a Virginia district court ruling and computer repair site Rescuecom lost a similar federal case against Google, but is appealing.
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Comments / What do you think?
February 17th, 2007
So the (theoretical) problem here is that if I searched for, say, Microsoft, I might get a paid ad for Apple?
I can see how this would be plenty annoying for a company, but I don’t really see the copyright violation here, except possibly a case that Google is indirectly making money off a copyrighted name…