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."

Comments

Windows

[BasilBrush]

Not quite as generic as "Windows" though, eh Microsoft?

Re:Windows

[Digana]

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. It's just like Apple isn't selling produce, so they can use that common word as a trademark. The genericity of a trademark depends on the domain to which it is applied. In the case of "app store", Microsoft has a good case, because Apple is trying to trademark the general shortening of "application". I don't think the shortening of "application store" to "app store" will be able to withstand the attack of genericity.

Re:Windows

[bondsbw]

So, what do you call these generic rectangle user interfaces containing buttons such as Close, Minimize, and Maximize, and a title bar, client area, and grips used to resize such generic rectangle UI? I have an idea of what I would call it, but according to you I would owe Microsoft money for the use of the word.

Re:Windows

[BasilBrush]

Back when Windows was trademarked, Microsoft's product was an application framework that let you create applications that ran in windows. Windows was as generic a term in computing then as it is in house construction now. It seemed absolutely ludicrous that Microsoft could trademark it. It might now seem so weird now, because we've got so used to it.

I don't think the shortening of "application store" to "app store" will be able to withstand the attack of genericity.

If "Windows" did, then "App Store" certainly will, if judgements are consistent.

Re:Windows

[Anonymous Coward]

"Killer App" was a common term years before "App Store". Geeks used this term all the time, even in the bulletin board days.

Re:Windows

[garyebickford]

As one of those ubernerds (I guess - I've never felt particularly uber), I worked with perhaps a dozen 'window systems' between 1978 and 1987. The entire 'workstation' market was based on window-based systems. I wrote a couple of toy ones myself. I recall that Microsoft's success in trademarking 'Windows' was both offensive to everyone in the industry, and an example of the stupidity of the people in charge of trademarks - similar to the software patents debacle. Prior to Microsoft, everyone distinguished their windowing system with a prefix such as X-Windows, etc. To this day, I persist in using 'MS Windows' when describing the Redmond Virus.

Re:other on line shoping sites had software downlo

[node 3]

Funny thing is it's never Apple or Apple fans that make this claim, just Apple detractors.

Re:Microsoft App[le] Store

[Anonymous Coward]

Luckily they grought pre-emptive multi-tasking to the desktop which apple introduced in their OS a century after Microsoft did.

Re:other on line shoping sites had software downlo

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because Apple fans have their mouth too full of Steve Jobs' cock to say much. :)

Re:Applications

[KarlIsNotMyName]

I used to name one of my partitions "Apps". Mainly because "Applications" didn't fit.

Re:Stores are often named for what they sell

[NiceGeek]

You've honestly never heard the term "killer app"? It predates the iPhone by years.