eBay Beats Tiffany In Net Trademark Case

sm62704 notes a Reuters story reporting that eBay has beat Tiffany in court in a "knockout" decision. If this had gone the other way, not only would eBay be in trouble (especially after the loss of a similar case in France), but so would Net commerce as a whole. Tiffany seems certain to appeal. "All of Tiffany's trademark infringement claims against eBay were rejected — a knockout blow to the four-year-old lawsuit that had been closely watched by Internet companies as well as luxury goods makers seeking to stop the sale of counterfeit products online. Tiffany & Co. had alleged that eBay turned a blind eye to the sale of fake Tiffany silver jewelry on its site. EBay had countered that it was not in a position to determine which goods were knock-offs... and had said the jeweler did not adequately participate in eBay's programs that help brand owners prevent fraud. The judge... said he was 'not unsympathetic' to Tiffany and others who have invested in building their brands only to see them exploited on the Web. But he said the law was clearly on eBay's side."

Comments

So are they going after street vendors?

[stomv]

There are brick and mortar equivalents to your eBay Tiffany vendor -- everything from tables in Chinatown to flea markets.

Does Tiffany's actively go after the flea market owners/managers who happen to have a vendor renting a flea market stand and selling fugazi jewelry?

Re:Thanks!

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

My pleasure. That's why I did it. I can't for the life of me understand why the major media, when they cover a litigation news story, never give you the actual document to read. In these days of electronic filing of almost all federal court papers it is inexcusable.

counterfeit goods

[MrKaos]

The judge... said he was 'not unsympathetic' to Tiffany and others who have invested in building their brands only to see them exploited on the Web.

Yeah but they don't mind sending the production process over to a country that

a) exploits *their* workers b) doesn't care about copyright

c) is prepared to make counterfeit goods from idle production time and undercut the company that outsourced the production process in the first place

Looks like those communist Chinese are learning how to be quite effective capitalists, what did Tiffany *expect* to happen. Except they don't go back to where and how the goods were produced noooooooo they go and sue a third party clogging up the legal system - what a mockery of the legal process. At least the judge used a foam club over the four year period.

eBay is digging a big hole

[Kupfernigk]

Auction houses in the real world depend for their success on reputation. They employ experts, real experts, to check the provenance of anything of any value. eBay is not a true auction house; it is a vehicle for the sale of stolen and counterfeit goods. Which means that, no matter what happens in the US today, eventually someone will come after it. Perhaps in the next big share collapse the real auction houses and goods manufacturers will buy its shares and simply shut it down; perhaps the Chinese will do what the US did, change from a country that encourages piracy to one that tries to stop it, and take action.

In the meantime eBay has created a hole for a real on-line auction system. It would be quite difficult to set up, require heavy means of seller verification, but provide a way to sell high value items securely.

Not that I am defending the "luxury goods manufacturers" who themselves are now fake. "Burberry", for instance, is just another Chinese knock off shop, while Barbour and Mulberry in the UK are real local manufacturers. Burberry has destroyed some of the value in the real manufacturers by its faking. It's Gresham's Law in action. There really should be a law that all vendors must state clearly in any advertisement what the main country of manufacture of their goods actually is.