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Facebook Says It Owns 'Book'
An anonymous reader writes "The Chicago Tribune is reporting that Facebook has sued a tiny start-up called Teachbook.com over the use of 'book' in its name. The start-up, which has two employees, aims to provide tools for teachers to manage their classrooms and share lesson plans and other resources. 'Effectively they're bombing a mosquito here, and we're not sure why they want to do that,' Teachbook.com co-director Greg Shrader told the Tribune. Facebook said its use of 'book' in its name is 'highly distinctive in the context of online communities and networking websites.' Facebook apparently is alleging that no other online 'network of people' can use the word 'book' in its name without violating its trademark."
Perhaps next they'll go after everyone who uses the words cookbook, handbook, and textbook.
...and go throw them at Facebook.
http://www.fuckbook.com/
Oh man, fuck off, Facebook, you giant corporate retard.
This trademark and patent stuff is getting beyond a joke. No-one will be able to do anything soon for fear of infringing on somethingorother from them or Amazon or Apple or MS or MPEG LA or blah blah because they claim they got to buttons or text or selling some bullshit first or some crap. No wonder innovation is drying up, piracy and sticking it to the man is rampant and no-one gives a toss about anything - everyone's too busy covering their own ass and hoping it will all magically go away.
There's protecting your innovation, trademarks, rights, etc. and then there's being a giant muppet. Facebook is a giant muppet.
I hope facebook looses a shit ton of money over this.
And how is this tiny, 2 employee company supposed to defend itself? No matter how right it is, 2 people will be bankrupted in no time. This is the nature of our corporate-owned country, inhabited by masochistic neo conservatives who want giant, faceless institutions with no obligation to anyone to step all over them like cockroaches. With the power of our vote we could use the government as a tool to protect the little guy from those with the resources to do almost anything they want. Instead we have Obama, the most conservative "Democrat" in the history of our country, to lead us to... what exactly?
Crap like this is the result of the US judicial system and your "elected" government. Your government enables this kind of rubbish. In the sentence before my last I surrounded elected with inverted commas. I did this because it seems to me as an outsider that the voice of the US people is incredibly diluted in US elections and things in general. Big business seems to have more of a say than individuals. There will be heaps of comments in this story saying how stupid it is, but your "elected" government doesn't care what you think -- it appears to care more about big business. What a load of shit. US, the land of opportunity? If you say so, but I am glad I don't live there. I'd rather pursue opportunity elsewhere in countries where opportunity really exists and is not an illusion created by a government. It's not facebook's fault that stuff like this can happen -- it's the US population's fault for _allowing_ it to happen.
http://www.pokebook.co.uk/
This would be called having them marked as a vexatious litigant.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
How about -space as a social networking suffix? or -dot or -gadget for tech sites or the file- prefix for download sites?
At which point does an entity get to decide that it owns a random word that forms *part* of its name? Just because they're the biggest? It would seem that they're not the first, so that argument doesn't stand up. Why -book and not face-, or will the face- lawsuits be coming shortly?
Wasn't teaching associated with books long before "social networking?"
Download free e-books, lectures, and tutorials at bookgoldmine.com
not really. The word "book" in "teachbook" is a reference to facebook. When anyone hears "teachbook" they immedaiately think "facebook for teachers".
All of those sites are references to actual books.
The legal concern isn't just that they're making a similar competing product, or that there will be confusion that Teachbook IS Facebook. The concern is that there will be confusion that Teachbook is a product of the Facebook team or that it is endorsed by Facebook or that it is affiliated with Facebook in any way. There are many families of products that share a particular element in their names, so it's not a far-fetched concern.
We've gone over this time and time again, for many different companies and products. Facebook is obliged by law to actively defend their trademark when the name of a competing product is similar and is in the same line of business. This is not a case where we can attribute any motivation to Facebook other than the fact that they're trying to carry out their legal obligations to retain their trademark. They risk losing the legal status of their trademark if they don't sue. Whether their claims are valid are for the courts to decide.
Other posts have said "what about this? What about that?" There are a few considerations to take. Did, e.g., Fuckbook file a trademark application for its name? Are cookbooks social networking sites? Some of the suggestions are simply absurd.
I mean, I hate trying to defend Facebook (indeed, I may even find Teachbook useful in a couple months' time), but you guys don't really have a problem with Facebook here. What you guys have a problem with is the law that requires Facebook to do stuff like this. But instead of recognizing this and having a meaningful conversation about whether or not trademark law is reasonable in its obligations, the editors allow flamebait articles like this on the site and get people all riled up not against the cause of the issue, but against only one of the many symptoms of the issue. Absolutely ridiculous. Quit feeding the trolls, guys.
Mea culpa: I have a face. I once owned a book. And now suddenly I'm very very scared....
its not what I immediately think, course I dont have my head jammed up my own ass
"Facebook doesn't have a leg to stand on"
Neither do you, really. Facebook have to defend their trademark to keep it. If they "lose" this case, they haven't actually lost the case; what has been shown is that 'teachbook' doesn't infringe the trademark, therefore, nobody can use the fact that 'teachbook' exists as a defence against their new trademark infringing name. If facebook don't go after it, and it is later shown that teachbook does infringe, but facebook didn't go after them, then facebook loses trademark rights.
This isn't really facebook's 'fault' here, this is just a consequence of how the law works. Facebook loses their trademark if they don't establish whether teachbook infringes or not, and stop it's use if it is found to be.
Still I do find myself wondering whether they would be calling their site 'teachbook' if 'facebook' didn't exist. They'd probably be calling it 'teachspace' instead. It does sound a little copycatty to me, but this is for the courts to decide.
The revolution will not be televised... but it will have a page on Wikipedia