Microsoft Starts Legal Fight Over Lindows Name

actappan writes: "Whether or not Lindows is real, this article on CNET News.com indicates that Microsoft intends to sue them into oblivion. Looks like supression remains the best way to promote innovation." cyberlawyer adds: "Some of you may remember that MS originally had great difficulty obtaining a trademark for the generic term 'Windows' but was eventually able to pay off those who had filed letters of protest to the granting of the mark including Sun, Oracle, and Borland. As a trademark lawyer I (unhappily) have to admit that Lindows probably has a weak case. Of course it's never too late to bring a cancellation action based on genericide ;-)" CodeWheeney contributes a link to coverage at Yahoo, too.

Comments

Nice username.

[autopr0n]

I'm just wondering if anyone else noticed this guy's username was 'gayrod'

Assuming you really are a very 'out-and-proud' homosexual lawyer, and not just some sort of troll trying to see how high he can get his post moderated and pointing to an unresolved DNS entry in user info with the word 'law' in it as your 'website'....

Then I'd have to say that while Microsoft may have a case, their trademark really shouldn't have been valid because it's obviously a pretty common word, even in computer science ('close that window'). I had always assumed that Microsoft's trademark was more along the lines of 'Microsoft windows' the way they do with "Microsoft Word", and "Microsoft Access"