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Microsoft Fights Apple Trademark On 'App Store'
angry tapir writes "Microsoft is asking the US Patent and Trademark Office to deny Apple a trademark on the name 'App Store,' saying the term is generic and competitors should be able to use it. Apple applied for the trademark in 2008 for goods and services including 'retail store services featuring computer software provided via the internet and other computer and electronic communication networks' and other related offerings."
Huh? Department stores don't sell departments. And WTF is a toilet store?
Pretty sure Sales Force came first.
Back in 2006, when the iPhone was but a gleam in Steve Jobs' eye. And now there are lots of 'app stores'; including Apple's, but also including the Android app store, and others.
So... where is Apple's eligibility for using this descriptive non-creative name as a trademark, if they do not have exclusive use, first use, or even most famous use in commerce?
As far as I'm concerned, Apple's product is the iTunes App Store, which is specific and famous, but App Store is generic, and used by many organization's before and after Apple.
Actually.. when I think of "App Store", the first thing that comes to mind for most people is the Android App Store. If anyone should be awarded the trademark (and they should not), it should be Google.
It's actually "Microsoft Windows", not "Windows".
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
"Settled out of court" translated to normal English really means "We would win against evil Microsoft if we had the funds to take this to the end, but sadly their lawyers are bleeding us dry with continual delays so we accepted their offer to settle."
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Microsoft would disagree...
http://www.microsoft.com/About/Legal/EN/US/IntellectualProperty/Trademarks/EN-US.aspx
"Microsoft" and "Windows" are two separate registered trademarks.
You're wrong. The US Patent and Trademarks Office doesn't let me link directly to it, so here's a cut and paste of Microsoft's Windows trademark.
Word Mark WINDOWS
Goods and Services IC 009. US 038. G & S: computer programs and manuals sold as a unit; namely, graphical operating environment programs for microcomputers. FIRST USE: 19831018. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 19831018
Mark Drawing Code (1) TYPED DRAWING
Serial Number 74090419
Filing Date August 20, 1990
Current Filing Basis 1A
Original Filing Basis 1A
Published for Opposition June 21, 1994
Registration Number 1872264
Registration Date January 10, 1995
Owner (REGISTRANT) Microsoft Corporation CORPORATION DELAWARE One Microsoft Way Redmond WASHINGTON 980526399
Assignment Recorded ASSIGNMENT RECORDED
Attorney of Record William O. Ferron, Jr.
Type of Mark TRADEMARK
Register PRINCIPAL-2(F)
Affidavit Text SECT 15. SECT 8 (6-YR). SECTION 8(10-YR) 20050407.
Renewal 1ST RENEWAL 20050407
Live/Dead Indicator LIVE
That's not how genericity of a trademark works. If Microsoft were in the business of selling large crystal panes that you can attach to walls to see through them, then yes, it couldn't call them "windows", because you're using the generic word for that product.
They don't sell "Windows: n. 1. transparent glass panes", but "Windows: n. 2. Primary graphical representations in a windowed GUI system".
Is it? Then show me what mobile device company was using "App Store" before Apple did.
e.g. Nokia used "Software Marketplace"
Microsoft used marketplace too. "Windows Mobile Marketplace" etc.
Android uses "Android Market".
App Store seems like the obvious thing to call it now, because Apple have been so successful with it. But other companies were not wanting to use it till Apple got there first.
The more intuitive word, assuming no prior prejudices, would probably be "boxes."
"It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations..." -Winston Churchill
The frames around an application's UI, that you can move around and such? Those were called "windows" in the trade press before Microsoft wrote their OS. A bit ago Microsoft sued Lindows claiming "Lindows" was too close to their "Windows" trademark. They dropped the suit when the judge said that the Lindows legal team had introduced enough evidence to call into question Microsoft's claim on the Windows trademark, and opted instead to buy the Lindows trademark for $20 million (the Lindows software is now called Linspire).
Still feeling quite so sure of your superiority to the OP?
And "applet" has been around as long as java has.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
"Apple is trademark happy -- snapping up all i*, and *pod names, including established names like podcast "
Isn't podcast derived from iPod? A downloadable broadcast that people listen to on their iPod. That would give Apple a good claim to the term.
Well no, settled out of court usually actually means "We never really had a case, so we've paid them off with a reasonable figure to avoid the potential that they could get awarded a massive, company destroying figure in court".
But as this is Slashdot and this is an anti-Microsoft thread I can understand how people like you might enjoy changing the status quo to suit your ignorant biased hatred.
Tell me this is a case of the 'winners' writing history. When 'Windows' came out there was a huge number of people mocking such a stupid name in the computing industry because it was a blatant knock off of the primary elemental division in a GUI --- which Microsoft was late to the party to get. Even in Dos applications functions were described by the 'window' as opposed to the screen.
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
Windows 1.0 came out in 1985.
It's predated by Xerox Star, the Apple Macintosh, Sun's SunView, the W Window System from Stanford, and early releases of the X indow System. Probably a bunch more too - Symbolics comes to mind. Of those, the Mac and SunView at the very least were widely used.
Microsoft, as usual, were late to the party.
That's not the word that they chose at Xerox, because they were concerned with the user perception, not the implementation. In implementation, they were just reserved regions of the frame buffer (Smalltalk-76 didn't support overlapping windows), but in terms of user interaction they were things that you looked through into your document - windows. This is why they called them windows (instances of the Window class in Smalltalk-76 and Smalltalk-80). This was almost a decade before MS Windows 1.0 (which also didn't support overlapping windows) was released.
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"Unleashing the Killer App: Digital Strategies for Market Dominance" - Harvard Business Press; Revised Edition edition (March 2000)
"application (app)" - Dictionary of Business Terms, Barron's Educational Series, Inc.; 3rd edition (May 1, 2000)
"Google Apps" - August 2006
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
http://www.microsoft.com/About/Legal/EN/US/IntellectualProperty/Trademarks/EN-US.aspx