Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 21st Mar 2011 23:00 UTC
There's a scene in American Beauty where Kevin Spacey masturbates in the shower, while his voice-over states: "This will be the highlight of my day. It's all downhill from here." That's how I feel right now. We just had Microsoft suing Barnes & Noble, which was already pretty low to begin with, but Apple just upped the ante by suing Amazon... Over the 'app store' trademark. For the love of god.
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Member since:2006-02-15
RE: Comment by roentgen
by Thom_Holwerda on Tue 22nd Mar 2011 00:25
in reply to "Comment by roentgen"
Member since:2005-06-29
RE[2]: Comment by roentgen
by mrhasbean on Tue 22nd Mar 2011 01:20
in reply to "RE: Comment by roentgen"
Member since:2006-04-03
That was because they received a letter from MS - not an actual lawsuit. Not that that makes it right, but only to point out that WereCatF is still right: Microsoft Windows is a trademark. Windows isn't.
Just the same as "App Store" has the trademark - neither "App" (being short for application as pointed out so insightfully in another post, and also being the first three letters of the Apple name), nor "Store", have.
;)
The name "App Store" has become synonymous with Apple whether certain people like it or not. Before Apple popularised it, and trademarked it, online software stores were called just that, online software stores, or more generically "webstore", and physical "software" stores were practically non-existant, all things Apple will argue in defence of it's trademark.
RE[2]: Comment by roentgen
by SlothNinja on Tue 22nd Mar 2011 03:22
in reply to "RE: Comment by roentgen"
Member since:2011-03-22
Actually, Microsoft has several US registered trademarks for the typed word WINDOWS for various goods and services. Registration 75980682 appears to be the registered trademark for operating systems and other types of software. US registered trademarks are easily searched at www.uspto.gov.
RE[2]: Comment by roentgen
by molnarcs on Tue 22nd Mar 2011 07:13
in reply to "RE: Comment by roentgen"
Member since:2005-09-10
That was because they received a letter from MS - not an actual lawsuit. Not that that makes it right, but only to point out that WereCatF is still right: Microsoft Windows is a trademark. Windows isn't.
Not only that, but I think Windows itself could be a trademark. Why? Because it is an arbitrary name for an operating system. No confusion with real windows, no confusion with an other operating system. Apple is a common noun, but referring to a operating system it is unique. However, application store or app store (there is a natural tendency in English to shorten names) is... well, an app store. GOG is an app store. The android market is an app store.
Regardless of what our resident fanboy (yeah, I'm looking at you mrhasbean) says, app store is not an arbitrary name that makes app store equivalent to Apple App Store. To put it in another way, trademarking app store (which describes the functionality and purpose of the service 100%) is equivalent to trademarking webstore. Amazon is a webstore, for example (it sells stuff on the web). If Amazon trademarked Webstore, they would have been wrong, regardless of some users associating webstore with Amazon. Or another example: this is like Microsoft trademarking "Operating System" - then suing everyone who used the term.
Member since:
2011-02-20
Let's not forget why Windows Commander is called Total Commander now. And there's no Microsoft in there... just windows.