NAI Sending "Sniffer" C&D Letters

RayMarron writes "It seems that NAI's IP lawyers have been billing some hours recently by sending nastygrams asking companies/individuals to stop using their trademarked term 'Sniffer.' Steve Gibson of Gibson Research Corporation has received one. The full text is posted on his news server, and I'm sure one of our readers will post it here. Or visit news.grc.com, grc.news and grc.news.feedback groups. A student at Stanford received one as well and forwarded it to the faculty to handle. Both Gibson (relating a conversation with his IP attorneys) and Stanford's reply seem to agree that 'sniffer' is too generic a term to be a viable trademark and can't be effectively enforced. Is there an IP lawyer in the house?"

Comments

sniffer loop has a long history in radio

[wowbagger]

The terms "sniffer loop", "sniffer probe", and "sniffer coil" have been in long use in the radio service industry - they all refer to a probe used to sample the H field near a coil in an RF circuit without affecting the circuit (much...).

Google search

Sniffer has always been brand name

[Cy Guy]

Sniffer was a commercial product from then Network General and came out at least by 1987. But they called it "The Sniffer" , which seems to have more of a brandname like sound to it.

And another Usenet post shows that at least as early as 1994 they were quite conscious of its growing use as a generic term and tried to deter it.

Maybe they should have been more proactive in stopping it use as a generic term, but it is a fine line to walk for companies since getting to be the "Kleenex" of your market niche makes you the defacto standard.