Chicago Law Firm Sues Over Hyperlink To Trademarked Name

TheSpoom writes "Large Chicago law firm Jones Day are suing internet startup BlockShopper over the issue of whether linking to a business with their trademarked name should be legal. It would seem they are using trademark dilution as a tool to get BlockShopper to cease linking to their website. The EFF has filed an amicus curiae, as might be expected. If Jones Day wins this suit, anyone linking using a trademarked name may be in legal hot water."

Comments

News at 11.

[Anonymous Coward]

Next in news: all trademarked names sink on Google.

Litigious bastards

[AKAImBatman]

Jones Day(TM) is going to have to get in line. SCO has existing use claims on linking litigious bastards, based on their extensive use of the mark between 2002 through present.

It's too bad the legal system isn't more accessible to the common man or baseless suits with intent to crush or scare wouldn't get filed so often.

Re:Litigious bastards

[Ethanol-fueled]

Who are Jones Day anyway? How could Jones Day be concerned with trademark dilution if nobody outside of their own damn office building knows who they are? If they were to become popular nationwide, i'd hope it'd be because of this discussion on slashdot - but would the Streisand effect be good or bad for Jones Day?

p.s. Jones Day sucks.

Re:Litigious bastards

[PhreakOfTime]

Well, Ive had the same experience. A local real estate company sent me a Cease and Desist Letter in regard to domains that they wanted, but did not want to offer compensation for.

The letter consisted of threatening to sue me, file CRIMINAL charges against me, and restraining orders. It also bordered on libel, as it stated for a fact that owning these domains was libelous and slanderous, without any court of law coming to that finding. The company who hired the, in my opinion, unethical attorney to send this letter was Caton Commercial

Since they sent that letter, and I published it on-line for my lawyer to read, the results seem to have been that their company name 'Caton Commercial' now comes up with the second result in google pointing to the Will County website which lists all the current and pending legal cases they are involved in personally, and because of their business practices.

Is there something about real estate where the blinders to the outside world are so intense, that they stop the line of thought the prevents a company from considering the 'law of unintended consequences'?

Re:Litigious bastards

[russotto]

The letter consisted of threatening to sue me, file CRIMINAL charges against me, and restraining orders. It also bordered on libel, as it stated for a fact that owning these domains was libelous and slanderous, without any court of law coming to that finding. The company who hired the, in my opinion, unethical attorney to send this letter was Caton Commercial

They can't libel you by communicating privately with you. But isn't threatening criminal prosecution to get their way in a civil matter bordering on blackmail?

Re:Litigious bastards

[PhreakOfTime]

You are correct. However, instead of actually looking up the name of the owner of these domains using a WHOIS, the lawyer who wrote the letter seemingly just opened up a phone book and found the same last name as me, and sent the letter there first. This was not my address.

The letter was sent to SOMEONE ELSE first, then back to the attorney, who then finally figured out he had the wrong address. This took almost 2 months before it finally made its way to me. That is why on the letter I posted online, the address is blacked out, since it is one of a completely unrelated party. The only similarity was that they have the same last name as myself.

These guys are on the ball, yes?

Re:Litigious bastards

[Anonymous Coward]

They're (I think) the third largest lawfirm in the world.

They own and fully use one of the nicer skyscrapers in the Cleveland area, as well as substantial office space in every major city in the world.

But that doesn't make them not pricks. :-)

Re:Litigious bastards

[Random BedHead Ed]

Who are Jones Day anyway? How could Jones Day be concerned with trademark dilution if nobody outside of their own damn office building knows who they are?

Congratulations, user 1125189, you've won a free trip to glorious Cleveland, Ohio, courtesy of Jones Day - One Firm Worlwide. Please proceed to your front door, where our siren-topped courtesy vehicle will pick you up in twenty minutes.

Re:Litigious bastards

[MichaelSmith]

I bought my current house from an individual who was forced to sell by his bank. In the years since he has got into more trouble but when court officials come looking for him they always come here because he didn't give them his new address.

One trick he seems to use is that when a lawyer refuses to work for him because they haven't been paid he just finds another lawyer and uses them to sue the previous one.

Re:Litigious bastards

[Tubal-Cain]

Is there something about real estate where the blinders to the outside world are so intense, that they stop the line of thought the prevents a company from considering the 'law of unintended consequences'?

They didn't write that one.

Re:Litigious bastards

[Tubal-Cain]

That is why on the letter I posted online, the address is blacked out, since it is one of a completely unrelated party.

You seem to be slashdotted.

Re:Litigious bastards

[Zordak]

Your post is cheeky and funny, but I would like to point out that in the legal arena, Jones Day is friggin' HUGE. These guys are not some two-bit operation. And yes, they do carry a reputation for pretentiousness and all-around snobbery* (I offer no opinion on whether it's deserved). That said, I know somebody who is an associate there (not in Chicago, though), and she's a brilliant and ethical attorney. So they're not all like this. The truth is, I work for a firm a little more than a tenth of their size, and you don't usually know what the guy down the hall is doing; much less the guy across the country. So if you meet a Jones Day attorney, remember, they're not all evil. Just the ones who filed this suit.

*This is my personal opinion and is not reflective of my firm's or anybody else's opinion.

Re:Litigious bastards

[Anonymous Coward]

Their contact form appears to have no server-side validation on the "Required Fields", I don't allow JavaScript by default so I don't know if they have client-side validation, easy enough to disable JavaScript though.

Re:Litigious bastards

[cmr-denver]

Who are Jones Day anyway? How could Jones Day be concerned with trademark dilution if nobody outside of their own damn office building knows who they are? If they were to become popular nationwide, i'd hope it'd be because of this discussion on slashdot - but would the Streisand effect be good or bad for Jones Day?

See, you're missing the point. What you really want to say is that bad laywers exist all over the place, but if you were interested in shysters that apparently have little grasp of the law, or any grasp of technology then people would be able to find such low life ambulance chasers.

Lawyers :::sigh:::

[copious28]

Man, cant the lawyers fight something that is more useful, like crooked Wall Street firms? What a waste of the court's resources.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[morgan_greywolf]

Some of those lawyers probably are crooked Wall Street investors. Ha!

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[Anonymous Coward]

Clients and money

Do you randomly fix people's computers for no pay just because that would be useful? Do you work for free because it is good or needed and refuse to work for pay?

Lawyers work for a client. They do not file suits on their own behalf. They follow the will of their clients. Blame the client.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[Anonymous Coward]

I never got this but... why does USA wants to solve everything via lawyers?

I fell over, let's sue someone.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[TheRealMindChild]

The thing with lawyers is... whether they are a saint, or whether they are a horrible human being that takes advantage of everyone and everything they can, they still get paid, and they still keep their job. Look at Jack Thompson for christ sake.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[Anonymous Coward]

The glamorization of specific events where the victim did something stupid and was awarding 10s of millions and doesn't have to work again might be a big draw for a lot of people.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[harryjohnston]

Lawyers work for a client. They do not file suits on their own behalf. They follow the will of their clients. Blame the client.

Did you read the article? In this case, the suit is being filed on behalf of the lawyers (to be precise, the law firm) and presumably they're representing themselves.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[Joebert]

That's a good question. I'm in the USA and I've been trying to figure that out for years. things would be soo much easier if people just handed me their money and got it over with.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[Tubal-Cain]

I fell over, let's sue someone.

Ballmer. He obviously took your chair.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[Tubal-Cain]

Somehow I doubt most of his income comes directly from his lawsuits with game companies.

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[mcclure]

Well, you know what they say - anyone who represents themselves has a fool for a client :)

Re:Lawyers :::sigh:::

[Anonymous Coward]

The crooked wall street firm's crooked officers pay the lawyers off and tell them to look elsewhere. It doesn't hurt when they remind the would be plaintiffs of the even nastier sharks, err, lawyers that they have in their own pens.

I say we give 'em what they want.

[greenguy]

You don't want us to drive traffic to your site? Fine by me.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[AKAImBatman]

They don't, actually. Jones Day is a law firm. The only sites they want linking to them are the ones that say, "This is a good lawyer to hire." ANYTHING else has the potential to shed light on the details of their business. Since law practice is not always clean and pristine (as this article demonstrates), Jones day is likely to be unhappy about drawing attention to their practices.

Disclaimer: This post is an opinion and makes no factual statements. By reading this post you waive all rights to sue, counterclaim, issue official correspondence, or even look at AKAImBatman (User #238306) with a funny look on your face.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[mugnyte]

  Well, it's amazing, but there are still plenty of people left to be introduced to the Streisand Effect.

  I say this should stand a strong advertisement that they are completely ignorant of how the web works, on both the original level of the case, and in the effect this latest press is giving them.

  "Aren't you that famous law firm that tried to censor teh interwebs? It doesnt work like that, dude"

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[mcgrew]

Not me. I think we should introduce them to Barbara Streisand.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[oldhack]

Never stops them from putting adverts in magazine, though.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[Altus]

No doubt. If I, for some reason, had this law firm on retainer I would be looking for a new firm already. This whole fisasco has to make one question the firms grasp of technology and law. Worse, it makes it clear that they lack any forethought. Right or wrong, what did they think was going to happen when they filed this suit? Did they not think that it would end up plastered all over the internet?

If I were one of their clients I would be questioning their judgment right now.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[Archangel Michael]

I'm looking at you funny. WHACHAGONNADOABOUTIT?

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[AKAImBatman]

Punish you, obviously.

I hereby call on the power of grayskull to mod parent +5 Funny!

We'll see how you like that!

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[Archangel Michael]

Who knew? Batman is He Man. I would never have guessed.

.
.
.

I've never been so ashamed in my life, as I am right now, for knowing that Grayskull is the home of He Man.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

This whole fisasco has to make one question the firms grasp of technology and law.

Especially their grasp of the law.

This is one case where a clearly correct analogy exists to print and broadcast media: If a print newspaper or broadcast news operation published the same information about the member lawyers, using their company name and giving their firm's contact information, they'd clearly be exercising "nominative fair use". The web site has clearly done exactly the same thin in a different medium.

In particular: How is this different from a print newspaper article delivered by FAX?

If a law firm wants to demonstrate competence when filing suits on its own behalf - especially when setting precedents where the outcome is virtually certain based on existing law - it should stick to those where the law is on their side. Such a firm should be advising their clients not to waste their time and money filing such losing suits. If they're willing to waste their OWN time and money in the same way what does that say about the advice they'd give a paying client?

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[TheRealMindChild]

I hate to break it to you, but Greyskull was recently paved over and replaced by a Walmart.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[Fumus]

I *really* hope they win this and every last webpage will be prohibited from linking to trademarked names.
Maybe this will show how absurd and detached from reality lawyers are.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[maglor_83]

or even look at AKAImBatman (User #238306) with a funny look on your face.

O_o

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[Anonymous Coward]

from wikipedia, but shares my knowledge about how trademark works:
The extent to which a trademark owner may prevent unauthorized use of trademarks which are the same as or similar to its trademark depends on various factors such as whether its trademark is registered, the similarity of the trademarks involved, the similarity of the products and/or services involved, and whether the owner's trademark is well known.

Now, they are not selling a competing product under the same or similar name,they do not have a product, and trademark has not copyright, so what is the base for this procedings?

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's cause She-Ra divorced He-man and, err... this is getting really lame.

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[hesiod]

> so what is the base for this procedings?

I believe that would fall under "scare tactic", or "intimidation."

Re:I say we give 'em what they want.

[scot4875]

No .... Greyskull was the home of the Sorceress. He Man was actually Adam, who lived in the Eternia palace.

At least, that's how I remember it. I can't click the Wikipedia link or I'll certainly get lost in a maze of articles about He Man, G.I. Joe, Thundercats, and all my other childhood favorites.

--Jeremy

How not to advertise your business

[BeerCat]

So, let's get this straight. You'd like people to be attracted to your business, but you don't want them to use your Name....

Kind of defeats the point in having a website, really.

Re:How not to advertise your business

[MozeeToby]

No, no. They're fine with most people linking to them, just not the people they don't like. Unfortunatly, what they really want is the power to sue anyone who dares say bad things about them. They may as well make breathing illegal, that way anyone the police don't like can be charged and everyone else won't be.

Re:How not to advertise your business

[AlHunt]

I had fun lately with some telemarketer calling to "update their database" - certainly not to try and SELL us anything. This is the last kind of crap we want.

I asked for her fax number so I could fax her our "Database Inclusion Agreemnet". They'd need to fill it out and return it with either the $2,500 annual license fee to include our copyrighted corporate name in their database or the $25,000 "Lifetime License Agreement". I explained that by including us without such agreement and fee we felt they would be guilty of copyright infringement and be referred to our legal department.

Not surprisingly, I got hung up on. I really need to get to work on that inclusion agreement. And get a legal department.

Re:How not to advertise your business

[0100010001010011]

However with Trademarks and Copyrights if you don't defend yourself against ALL the violations (even if you 'like' them), don't you forfeit the right to do so?

Re:How not to advertise your business

[Walkingshark]

Except that linking to a website isn't a trademark violation.

Re:How not to advertise your business

[Darth]

Copyright has no requirement to aggressively defend it.

Trademark does, but using a trademark to identify the business that owns the trademark isn't an abuse of the trademark. It's the purpose of the trademark.

Re:How not to advertise your business

[0100010001010011]

But if you're going to argue that it is, then you have to argue against all of them. "Well its only a trademark violation if we don't like them" isn't much of a good offense.

Re:How not to advertise your business

[kent_eh]

Simply saying (typing) their name isn't a violation, it's fair use.
The defendant created a list of landowners (culled from the public record) with links to those owners, and posted it online.
How can linking to someone's web page and stating "they own this" (I.E. stating a fact) be a violation of copyright?
Or maybe they want to sue everyone who reads the sign on their building aloud too...

Re:How not to advertise your business

[Apple Acolyte]

IANAL, but if you allow infringement or dilution of your I.P. to continue for an indefinite period of time, the law penalizes you for not be vigilant in protecting your rights and may apply the doctrine of "latches" to your claim. It depends on the court's assessment of the particulars involved and as such is only really defined by common law precedent, AFAIK. I'd love to hear from lawyers experienced with Internet litigation to what extent courts employ latches in those cases. I suspect that as a judicial doctrine it has become less relevant in contemporary times, for a number of reasons. But as for this particular firm's claim, unless another entity is using the trademark to masquerade as the firm or otherwise confuse the public, they've got no standing whatsoever.

Re:How not to advertise your business

[Anonymous Coward]

However with Trademarks and Copyrights if you don't defend yourself against ALL the violations (even if you 'like' them), don't you forfeit the right to do so?

Well, if you go after obvious non-infringement, or otherwise go over-aggressive about it, you can be found to be abusive and lose the right to the trademark. Im surprised Monster (the overpriced audio wire company) still has their trademark after some of the tish they have pulled.... wtf does a boutique vintage clothing store have to do with audio cabling?

Re:How not to advertise your business

[barzok]

You should have called it a "Database Inclusion Agreemnet Form". That way you could rightly tell her to DIAF.

Jones Day Contact Form

[DankNinja]

Let 'em know what you think:

http://www.jonesday.com/contact/contact.aspx

--

Re:Jones Day Contact Form

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's break their auto-mailer...

function isEmail(email) {
        var invalidChars, badChar, atPos, periodPos;

        invalidChars = " /:,;";

        if (email == "") { // cannot be empty
                return false;
        }
        for (i=0; i -1) {
                        return false;
                }
        }
        atPos = email.indexOf("@",1) // there must be one "@" symbol
        if (atPos == -1) {
                return false;
        }
        if (email.indexOf("@",atPos+1) != -1) { // and only one "@" symbol
                return false;
        }
        periodPos = email.indexOf(".",atPos)
        if (periodPos == -1) { // and at least one "." after the "@"
                return false;
        }
        if (periodPos+3 > email.length) { // must be at least 2 characters after the "."
                return false;
        }
        return true;
}

Maybe foo@jonesday.... would work...

Re:Jones Day Contact Form

[bendodge]

I used that to send them a link to this article under the name "Bird Snest", with the email address "birdsnest@slashdot.org". I hope it gets through and somebody reads it. :P

Re:Jones Day Contact Form

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe disabling JavaScript would work.
protip: There's no server-side validation.

In other news...

[Eravau]

...every newspaper, news broadcast, book publisher and public speaker in the country is being sued for having ever mentioned an entity with a trademarked name.

Yes, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

How would Microsoft, Google, and Yahoo! feel about this?

Re:Yes, but...

[Ortega-Starfire]

They feel that you need to learn how to hyperlink properly. If I missed the joke, insert woosh sound here.

Re:Yes, but...

[TheSpoom]

*whoosh*

(Dude's creating trademark confusion, methinks.)

Re:Yes, but...

[_Sprocket_]

They feel that you need to learn how to hyperlink properly. If I missed the joke, insert woosh sound here.

Re:Yes, but...

[dietdew7]

Has this technique of having the hyperlink text say one thing and the actual link point somewhere else been patented yet? The applications are endless.

Re:Yes, but...

[Ortega-Starfire]

I was going to hyperlink, but I didn't want to get sued.

Re:Yes, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why, I agree good sir! It's a good thing Jones Day didn't patent it first!

Re:Yes, but...

[PhreakOfTime]

Yes, its called a 'google bomb'.

Check upthread where the technique is used to link to a county courthouse website list of cases, by including the link of the company for the text.

Caton Commercial

Not surprisingly, when you do a google search for 'caton commercial' the second result(for me, may differ by geography) is a link to the courthouse, with the 'title' of the link being caton commercial.

P.S. It helps greatly if your linked text, is actually in the page you are linking to somewhere.

Now go have yourself some fun ;)

Re:Yes, but...

[_Sprocket_]

I was going to hyperlink "here" so that the "whoosh sound" was inserted appropriately... but I really hate hyperlinks to the word "here."

Re:Yes, but...

[sixsixtysix]

Go hate yourself, here.

Re:Yes, but...

[WTF Chuck]

I think that when someone searches for "jones day law firm", the first result should be "This Link Removed Due to Potential Trademark Infringement", and the rest pointing to websites with negative views of the firm.

Dan Reidy

[DankNinja]

Better yet,

contact the guy in charge:

Daniel E. Reidy

Tel: 1.312.269.4140
Fax: 1.312.782.8585

Email: dereidy@jonesday.com

Re:Dan Reidy

[Philosinfinity]

How is Daniel Reidy in charge? Are we talking in charge of the Firm or in charge of this particular lawsuit? It must be the lawsuit, because the firm's managing partner is Stephen J Brogan.

Re:Dan Reidy

[DankNinja]

He's in charge of the Chicago office:

http://www.jonesday.com/locations/locdetail.aspx?locid=S8

Re:Dan Reidy

[DankNinja]

http://www.jonesday.com/locations/locdetail.aspx?locid=S8

Re:Dan Reidy

[DankNinja]

The lawsuit is about http://chicago.blockshopper.com/

and Jones Day's Chicago office is handling it.

Re:Dan Reidy

[TubeSteak]

Better yet,

contact the guy in charge:

Daniel E. Reidy

And when you contact him, make sure you tell him that "Jones Day is pants"
When he says "no it's not" you tell him "Barclays is better"

If you don't get it: http://www.google.com/search?q=%22is+pants%22
/I'd encourage you not to send a fax, since toner is expensive.

Re:Dan Reidy

[Philosinfinity]

Understood, but as someone who works in the legal environment, I can tell you right now that if the Firm Managing Partner does not have a direct feed to public relations issues, you'll get no result. While Mr. Reidy may be the Office Managing Partner of Chicago, decisions from Firm Counsel always go to the Firm Managing Partner for ultimate decision making.

Re:Dan Reidy

[Anonymous Coward]

It's great that you just found a great way to show off your vocabulary, but that's the guy running the office in charge of the suit. Plus, it seems to be scored as Funny. If it were Informative, I'd agree with you.

Re:Dan Reidy

[Anonymous Coward]

Or if you prefer...to send them multi-page faxes to every single one of their fax numbers. The caveat? You must use a solid dark color piece of construction paper...preferably black.

Interesting site, BlockShopper

[Rurik]

In reviewing the site, I can see how it pisses people off. You get someone mad and they'll find some way to attack. The site canvasses the real estate market in a few large cities and makes not of prominent people that buy or sell property. It then does a mini-bio on the person, sometimes with their picture example. The site is fully within their rights to do so, but I can understand the feelings of a person suddenly showing up on there with their life story just because they bought a house. So, they find loop holes to get it taken down.

Re:Interesting site, BlockShopper

[TheSpoom]

Yeah, but honestly, I wonder if they even sent them an email before suing them in federal court. And even then, couldn't they have found some sort of invasion of privacy statute?

I realize the point of this suit is to get them to settle and just stop linking, but at least try to make it sound legitimate.

Re:Interesting site, BlockShopper

[Altus]

Its not invasion of privacy to post publicly available information on the internet.

The purchase and sale of property is a mater of public record and are generally listed in the classified section of your local news paper. Taking that information and combining it with the results of a google search on the buyer or sellers name is certainly not invasion of privacy, though it might make you re-think the kind of info you put on line.

Im still not quite sure what the point of the web site is though.

Re:Interesting site, BlockShopper

[morgan_greywolf]

And even then, couldn't they have found some sort of invasion of privacy statute?

Nope. They're using information that's already publicly available. All real estate purchases are a matter of public record (by necessity). The rest of the info from bios just seems to come from newspapers or websites or whatever -- remember, these are prominent people, so they get talked about lot in the media and on the Internet.

Re:Interesting site, BlockShopper

[TheSpoom]

I agree. I wasn't really saying that any iteration of their claim actually had merit, just that they seemed to not put any real effort into the thing, and ended up making it so preposterous that any judge with even an inkling of technical knowledge should laugh them out of the courtroom.

Re:Interesting site, BlockShopper

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"are generally listed in the classified section of your local news paper"

So you admit that the information is CLASSIFIED!

Re:Interesting site, BlockShopper

[Anonymous Coward]

How the hell did this become a troll post? Someone nuke that mod.

Re:Interesting site, BlockShopper

[hesiod]

> any judge with even an inkling of technical knowledge

Uh oh... they're screwed.

Crazy Idea

[dcollins]

I feel like maybe we should change or duplicate the standard [a href="foobar"] tag to just say [go to:"foobar"]. Then when these cases come up it will be even more blatant that the free-speech question is really "Am I allowed to say 'go to: foobar'?".

OK

[Quiet_Desperation]

Click this link to visit a big, fat pile of assholes.

Pfft! And they try to gain cred by claiming to be "Pro Bono". I bet they've never even MET Bono. :-)

Re:OK

[Hyppy]

Pfft! And they try to gain cred by claiming to be "Pro Bono". I bet they've never even MET Bono. :-)

They're actually pro-SONNY Bono, considering their apparent view on copyrights and trademarks.

Re:OK

[iainl]

Why would anybody be pro Bono? Every time that bastard clicks his fingers, someone dies! How sick is that?

Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[darkmeridian]

Jones Day was founded in Cleveland and has its largest office there. Moreover, the problem is people linking non-Jones-Day-related stuff to "Jones Day." Pretend I linked your name to "Asshole."

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[nizo]

Yeah, but if you were a lawyer and people searching for "sue my asshole ex husband" on gooooogle saw your link first, imagine how happy you would be.

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[andy1307]

Asshole

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[pembo13]

Well then they have even less of a case. As I understand it, they don't want people using their trademarked name in the hyperlink text.

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[Locklin]

Imagine how happy you would be if I sued you for something frivolous. Or how about if a bird crapped on your car.

The law doesn't exist just to make people happy.

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[sharkey]

Pretend I linked your name to "Asshole."

Just so long as you don't link it to "lawyer".

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[bh_doc]

Last time a bird crapped on my car I dumped her.

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[Anonymous Coward]

You would be telling them the truth.

* Posted Anonymously to keep everyone that doesn't know me in the dark - for now

Re:Jones Day Is Based In Cleveland

[Anonymous Coward]

-1 Tautology

Guess they'll have to sue the phone book, too.

[EWAdams]

It also includes their trademarked name. How dare it!

Wacker Street!

[DankNinja]

They are located on 'Wacker' Street!
That explains it all...

77 West Wacker
Chicago, Illinois 60601-1692
Tel: 1.312.782.3939
Fax: 1.312.782.8585

http://www.jonesday.com/locations/locdetail.aspx?locid=S8

Re:Wacker Street!

[Anonymous Coward]

Dumbass. It's Wacker Drive.

Re:Wacker Street!

[Anonymous Coward]

Are they on upper or lower?

Re:Wacker Street!

[DankNinja]

According to their site, it's no street or drive - it's just, er West Wacker (sounds like a porn star)

77 West Wacker
Chicago, Illinois 60601-1692
Tel: 1.312.782.3939
Fax: 1.312.782.8585

Re:Wacker Street!

[BlueStrat]

They are located on 'Wacker' Street!
That explains it all...

Yes!! We could've alerted the Blues Brothers if Jake were still alive!!

"Well, this is definitely Lower Wacker Drive. If my estimations are correct, we should be very close to the Honorable Richard J. Daley Plaza." Jake: "That's where they've got that Picasso." Elwood: "Yep."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wacker_Drive

Cheers!

Strat

re

[JohnVanVliet]

what is next Example for a forum post -------- Have you done a "ALL Mighty Search " to look for it

block incoming traffic?

[eleuthero]

I am not too much into web design but... Why not just have a cookie (don't all websites do this now whether we want them to or not?) that checks the previous webpage and blocks those originating from BlockShopper? Or for that matter, from any unwanted site?

Slashdot 'Em!!!

[Maestro485]

Seriously, their server is already slow and there's barely 20 comments.

Oh, the irony :)

Re:Slashdot 'Em!!!

[Vectronic]

It's a shame that Slashdot can't really afford to have a dedicated Slashdotting option.

Article
Summary summary summary

tags: tag1 tag2
(Click Here To Participate In Slashdotting)

Where it opens up some frame around the target site and automatically refreshes it every 2 seconds or something... then we could have rankings, "Slashdotted in 18.37 minutes - new record!"

Yes.

[Planesdragon]

Large Chicago law firm Jones Day are suing internet startup BlockShopper over the issue of whether linking to a business with their trademarked name should be legal.

Yes, it should be.

"RPGs? Try White Wolf or Wizards of the Coast."

Trademarks exist to differentiate businesses. You have an ABSOLUTE RIGHT to use somebody else's trademark to refer to them or describe their product. Any law that says otherwise is fundamentally flawed, and violates the first amendment.

A trademark is a name, and names are fundamental to speech.

Re:Yes.

[fyoder]

Its not as simple as that, according to the article.

BlockShopper used pictures of Jones Day lawyers grabbed from the Jones Day web site, and it linked to the site, but Jones Day doesn't seem worried about this. Instead, our review of the Jones Day complaint shows that the issue cited is "confusion"â"the claim is that people visiting BlockShopper and seeing the pages in question might assume that it was somehow officially related to Jones Day. This is... unlikely (see our example from the site).

Customer confusion is a classic trademark issue. I would hope that the author is correct in being doubtful, though back when the web was relatively new I would get complaints from visitors regarding sites I'd linked to as though I was responsible for the linked site. Hopefully by now people have it figured out. Now I just get complaints about my choice of sites to link to where I made no such choice, but google ads did.

Re:Yes.

[Anonymous Coward]

Bah, you don't need those pesky names.
I for one thing that XXXXX is a great example of why you don't need names, with XXXXX and others such as XXXXX and XXXXX names are no longer an issue and it can be completely XXXXX.

So don't use the trademark!

[Tevo-D]

If one were making a portal site (or whatever the current name of such a thing is), couldn't they link using the IP address instead of the trade name? How often do server IP's *REALLY* change?

A mechanism can be built to track the IPs over time and update the links database as well...

Re:So don't use the trademark!

[skis]

Many websites nowadays are hosted using "Virtual Hosting". This means that there is more than one website hosted at that particular IP address, and the web server determines which data to send back to the user by looking at the Host: header in the HTTP request.

Re:So don't use the trademark!

[lazybeam]

Could just use tinyurl.com. :)

Why are US lawyers behaving like utter idiots?

[Anonymous Coward]

We see a lot of nonsense of this kind, so this particular case is not in any way remarkable.

However, every time that such a case pops up, I find myself asking the same question: why are the lawyers who actually submit these suits on behalf of their companies such utter idiots that they allow it to happen, let alone instigate it?

"Because their CEO tells them to" is no answer, because lawyers are hired to give legal advice, not to say "Yes" --- in fact they have to give good advice as a professional responsibility. So why are they not saying "No John, we can't really do that, and not just because of the PR repercussions, but because of what it would entail if everyone did this on the net." And then explain how such things would simply destroy the Internet if successful.

Why is this not happening? Instead, the lawyer profession US-wide (and a bit beyond US boundaries too) is acting like IQ 20 submorons with extra helpings of stupidity and a total lack of social conscience and zero professional pride.

What's going on? I just can't understand this at all.

Re:Why are US lawyers behaving like utter idiots?

[PitaBred]

I think you answered your own question... it's not hard to get a monkey to repeat the answers to a test or bar exam. It is hard to get one to not act:

like IQ 20 submorons with extra helpings of stupidity and a total lack of social conscience and zero professional pride.

Re:Why are US lawyers behaving like utter idiots?

[Anonymous Coward]

And why do programmers write such bad code? Why are developers pushing out programs that require patch after patch after patch after patch after patch.

Why aren't developers waiting until products are fully developed before they release them. "Because their CEO tells them to" is no answer. Developers are paid to develop solid, working programs, and not programs that crash and crash after each build.

The developer profession US-wide (and a bit beyond US boundaries too) is acting like IQ 20 submorons with extra helpings of stupidity and a total lack of social conscience and zero professional pride.

See what I did there? You're an idiot.

Re:Why are US lawyers behaving like utter idiots?

[Anonymous Coward]

But you haven't answered the question.

Let's assume that your analogy with developers has merit. Fine, let's assume that this means that developers are IQ 20 morons. You are 100% right, end of that point.

Now having agreed on that, why are US lawyers behaving like utter idiots?

Depends

[Rene S. Hollan]

I would think whether the trademark was infringed or diluted would depend on a few things:

1) what the context of the description around the trademark was;

2) whether the trademark hyperlinked to something disparaging, confusing, or dilutional.

For example, if I write an article about Apple Records, and include a hyperlink with the text "Apple" pointing to a different record company, that would be confusing and dilutional. Same thing if I wrote an article about photocopiers and used Xerox® to like to a page listing generic photocopier companies -- that's clearly dilution.

But, if I wrote an article about Xerox® Corporation, and used Xerox® as a hyperlink to their home page, that's hardly misuse.

I suppose if I used the trademark in a hyperlink to a page disparaging the company, that might be suspect. While criticism is free speech, using a corporate trademark to associate with such criticism instead of the company or product may be misuse -- best get legal advice in that case.

Re:Depends

[Splab]

Good point, except I think Xerox lost their trademark status because they failed to protect it.

Re:Depends

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"...using a corporate trademark to associate with such criticism instead of the company.."

That's the issue, the company NAME is their trademark.

Re:Depends

[Rene S. Hollan]

Yes, they failed to defend against it's dilution. Or, if they didn't fail, they came close to it. I vaguely remember adds that said "This is a copier. Xerox is a company" or something like that.

Re:Depends

[Rene S. Hollan]

Right, but it is one thing to say "This is a critcism of X®" where X® links to the company's website, and quite another to say "This article is a review of various manufactures of foos, such as A®, B®, C® and have B® link to a scathing disparagement without evidence to back it up, insted of B®'s website -- particularly if A® and C® link correctly.

You can certainly criticize B®, but what you can not do is use B® as identifying anything other than the owner or product associated with the trademark.

What if all the trademarks were links to reviews and not to their holder's websites -- that is not single out B® for harsher treatment? I think this would still be infringement becuase using a trademark to refer to something about what the trademark represents and not what it represents directly, is infringement.

That might be a tough concept for tech-heads: after all the name is just a moniker for whatever metadata it is associated with in the present context, whether it be a corporate website, picture of a prodect, or a criticism of same. But that's a rational technical argument and not a legal one.

I suppose, in the context of a web page, a non-infringing use of a trademark would be a link to an image of the product, or the website of the trademark holder, in the same way that a non-infringing use of a trademarked company name would be to associate it with an address and telephone number in a directory.

Similarly, in a Consumer Reports-style (and I probably infringed on Consumer Reports trademark there -- using it as an adjective) review of various manufacturers, a list of trademarked names, and the locations (pages) where the holder is reviwed is fair game: the trademark refers to the holder, and the page number refers to the review.

IANAL, and am not even sure of the case law on this subject, but I think that so long as a trademark is (a) noted as such, and (b) refers to either what is trademarked or the holder, it's use is fair game. I remember when Slashdot used to use a stylized IBM® graphic to refer to articles about IBM. IBM politely requested that the stylization be dropped, IIRC, but that the use to refer to articles about them was permitted.

Re:Depends

[Anonymous Coward]

Good point, except I think Xerox lost their trademark status because they failed to protect it.

Ah, but in the case of Xerox the word was being used as a generic verb for "copy a document". In the Jones Day nonsense, "Jonesday.com" is being used to refer to Jones Day - exactly what a trademark is for.

Cleveland/Ohio Law Firm not Chicago

[QuessFan]

In what sense if Jones Day a Chicago Law firm.

In the legal circle, Jones Day is always know for their Cleveland/Columbus Ohio law firms.

With all the mergers of law firms into mega firms, the traditional regional law firms identity/image may had lag a little bit from that reality. But as a law librarian, I had discussions with firm law librarians at Jones Day, and people at branch offices still consider the Cleveland office to be "The headquarter."

Re:Cleveland/Ohio Law Firm not Chicago

[RobertSeattle]

I realize legal people would know Jones Day is HQ'd in Cleveland "not that there is anything wrong with that..." but it's isn't too obvious from the JonesDay.com website.

Re:Cleveland/Ohio Law Firm not Chicago

[QuessFan]

Well, as I said all those regional law firms are merging with each other to become national/global law firm, or at least try to give that impression in their marketing materials.*

I am just wondering about why the illogical label of "Chicago law firm" on Jones Day. When people talk about "Chicago law firm," people think about Kirkland & Ellis, Mayer Brown, MWE, Sidley Austin, Jenner Block, etc.

*Generally speaking. Law firms with niche practice will plug their location, administrative law/regulatory focused law firm will highlight their Washington DC office. IP law firms highlight their silicon valley office. Corporate law firm used to highlight their NYC/London offices, but who knows those day.

Headquartered in Cleveland

[JollyRogerX]

Jones Day is actually headquartered in Cleveland, though they have many law offices around the world, including Chicago.

Why don't they just...

[isBandGeek()]

... redirect their link to somewhere to make that link not work?

Re:Why don't they just...

[Fnord666]

referrer + redirect = goatse
QED

Don't talk about me!

[russotto]

Lots of companies seem to think that trademark is a blanket rule to prevent others from talking about you (consider that the NFL thinks you can't mention team names without their permission!). It doesn't help that there's the occasional idiot judge who upholds that kind of thing.

Death of The Web

[StormReaver]

If a judge is insane enough to decide in favor of Jones Day, the World Wide Web in all countries which recognize trademarks would come to a screeching halt. Google, MSN, and Yahoo would cease to exist almost overnight as their stock price plummeted to zero instantly.

Re:Death of The Web

[Xuranova]

uh no.

1. Their stocks wouldn't plummet to 0.
2. Those 3 companies (esp MS) have more lawyers than this law firm and a much bigger bankroll to appeal this to the end of time.

  MS has fended off the government by themselves. With Google and Yahoo! backing them, they can wipe this law firm off the map.

Re:Death of The Web

[InsaneMosquito]

MS has fended off the government by themselves. With Google and Yahoo! backing them, they can wipe this law firm off the map.

Conveniently enough, that's exactly what they want.

Re:Death of The Web

[canajin56]

Death of a lot more than that. They aren't actually suing over the link, if you read the linked articles. They are suing over their name being mentioned at all. The hyperlink is only even mentioned to get the /. crowd enraged. While true that it does contain a hyperlink, they are not suing for that, they are suing because they believe the article written ABOUT THEM may falsely mislead people into believing it was written BY them.

Re:Death of The Web

[maglor_83]

the World Wide Web in all countries which recognize trademarks would come to a screeching halt

Fortunately, most countries don't use US court decisions as precedents.

Time to rethink using Jones Day?

[GBC]

Before today I would have said Jones Day were a good law firm, but making such a weak claim just makes them look incompetent. This is almost certainly an allowed use of their trade mark and suggesting it is in any way infringement is a stretch (to put it politely).

I wonder how many current and potential clients of the firm have seen the details on this lawsuit and are thinking about not using Jones Day for any future work. I know I would be.

hilather

[Anonymous Coward]

Search engines are going to get punked if this goes through.

All this proves is ...

[Skapare]

... lawyers tend to be the most confused about anything new and/or involving high tech.

Use of trademarked links...

[seifried]

If this decision goes to the law firm than it seems to me that certain companies/industries are entirely screwed. Yellow pages anyone? Maps? I know that traditionally these are seen as "facts" and are thus quasi public-domain, but this seems to be shifting the line dangerously.

Slashdot fails again.

[Anonymous Coward]

Jones Day is based in Cleveland, not Chicago. For such a simple fact, you think a techie would get it right.

Makes me wonder what else the submitter got wrong in the summary.

Techies should stick to writing code and leave the legal issues up to the lawyers.

Re:Slashdot fails again.

[DankNinja]

Well, the lawsuit is about http://chicago.blockshopper.com/

The Jones-Day Chicago office are apparently handling the suit.

Jones Day is based in Cleveland, not Chicago. For such a simple fact, you think a techie would get it right.

Makes me wonder what else the submitter got wrong in the summary.

Techies should stick to writing code and leave the legal issues up to the lawyers.

so just use some of these strings for the links...

[wardk]

I don't even have to list one my disgusting ideas for what to call their website when links.

use your own imagination, hang it off this thread....

They don't want me to link to them?

[rickb928]

I really don't have a problem with that.

And if it becomes illegal, then I don't have a lot of trouble there either.

Are they trying to break Google or what?

ps- note to you crazy guys at Jones Day: Don't bother. Not worth it. Google doesn't care about your business.

Preemptive De-Linking

[xrayspx]

As a move to avoid the possibility of getting caught up in a suit, I think Google, Yahoo, MSNLive, Ask and every other engine should remove any reference to this domain.

If no one can find you via search engines, and no one links to you, what good is your site? They would probably sue the engines if they de-listed that domain for some wacky antitrust mumbo jumbo, "conspiracy to not help us make a living" or somesuch.

If the Law firm wins....

[Digital_Mercenary]

We should start an internet wide link party. Let e sue that....

Odd

[Anonymous Coward]

Since their trademark name is IN their domain name, should they also be suing their domain registrars, the whois DB maintainers, and ultimately ICANN for using their trademarked name in the domain in the first place? Gee there's no end to the devious nature of the InterWeb...

my brain AutoCompleted this sentence

[toby]

"The EFF has filed an amicus curiae, asserting that the plaintiffs are a bunch of idiots who have no clue how the web works and can't be trusted with ordering a latte let alone managing their own brand."

PROFIT!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm trademarking "Here". PAY UP SUCKA'S!

They should be happy with me

[jc42]

I have no intention of ever linking to their site.

(Actually, this isn't hypothetical. I've been asked by the claimed owners of a couple sites to remove links to their sites from mine. I did so, and added them to my DoNotLink file as a reminder. I think I'll add Jones Day to the file. If they don't want publicity, I'm happy to comply.)

*sigh* aren't they every going to learn?

[getuid()]

Aren't people ever going to learn that they harm themselves most this way?

All you & me need to do is *not* link to the respective website(s). Now guess who's going to hurt this most... I don't think it's going to be me.

Why does everyone miss the obvious solution?

[mmell]

In court, merely argue that other websites are also hyperlinking to, ah, the plaintiff's website and that this is not a matter of trademark/copyright protection, but rather a transparent attempt at a discriminatory practice. Countersue on that basis.

Legal nonsense, but when coupled with an honest, good faith campaign to ensure that no one creates links to their website, well . . . when even the Goog can't display your links, what's the point of having a web presence?

Wha?

[airship]

Are these guys idiots?

Oh... wait... I see they're lawyers. So my question is redundant.

Never mind.

The obvious answer

[Anonymous Coward]

So we shouldn't use a companies name as the link to them?
What should we use; "RickRoll" or "AssHats"?

Clarification of the article

[GPS Tracking]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I read the article different than some of you. I don't think they care about their name pointing to their site from other sites. I think the problem is they don't like other companies using their product name and pointing the link at a competitor site. For example: Linking the word "slashdot" all over the internet and pointing it to a website other than slashdot.org. This method of linking becomes very competitive when you start pointing product names to other websites. Each company is going to have a different perspective on this issue, but organic placement of these links seems wrong to me.

Now this is

[Shadowlore]

Patently absurd

Would this include the URL?

[nobodymk2]

OKAY, the world is coming to an end, but how are we supposed to avoid using a trademarked name (we can refer to Microsoft as M$ in plain text) when it appears in the URL? (as in microsoft.com?) Do they realize they may very well destroy the internet (as search engines wont exist anymore), setting the world back, technologically, about 30 years?