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UK Company Successfully Claims Ownership of "Pinterest" Trademark
judgecorp writes "Pinterest could be in trouble — a British firm has successfully claimed ownership of the European trademark 'Pinterest', even though it has not yet used the term in any public products. Pinterest was formed in 2011, and popular by 2011, but did not launch in Europe until 2012 — months after the UK company Premium Interest had registered the trademark. That trademark has now been confirmed by the European Commission's Office for the Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM). Since so much of Pinterest's business is based on its name, the ruling could force Pinterest to change its name — a move which has precedents: Microsoft is changing the name of Skydrive because it infringes the trademark of British broadcaster BSkyB, normally known as Sky."
Where is that stated anywhere?
none
I know nothing about UK law, but in the USA you have actually use a trademark for it to be valid. If they registered the mark in 2012, and still haven't used it in 2014, then they should be seen as squatters, not legitimate users of the mark.
From what the summary says, these people saw someone using the name for a US service and claimed the trademark in Europe before the US company could. This seems to me to be an exceptional example of abuse of the system.
Why can't they just continue using the name let the people in EU access the .com site? This very well be a silly question, but I see this kind of thing come up once in a while and I've never been able to figure out the answer. There are no borders in the internet, so is there a reason they have to cater to this? If so, why hasn't some country like China simply done that for whatever US company it suddenly doesn't like or wants to screw over?
Funny that this happens also the other way round (EU-based company taking over a trademark of a US-based company in a hostile manner).
You probably don't know, but in the 19th century the Czech brewery Budweiser was exporting its lagers to the US. However, they didn't register the trademark (probably didn't know about it back then). And voila, Anheuser-Busch within 10 years registered the US trademark and started to make "beer" that was completely unlike the original (dating back to 13th century). Biggest audacity happened then in the '90s when they tried to squeeze out the original Czech brewery out of European market. As a consequence, EU banned the US Budweiser from ever using this name in Europe. You can get the original Budweiser/Budvar under then name Czechvar in the US nowadays.
Cheers!
UK company Premium Interest ...
Troll.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
It might be interesting to consider that Microsoft was able to claim a trademark on "Windows", "Word" and "Excel", et. al under US of A laws. Common words.
Word and Excel are fine. They have nothing to do with the business that Microsoft is in, or with the product. "Windows" is a bit dubious because "Windows" is a computing term. Apple has trademarks for "Numbers" and "Pages".
A US startup called "Bytemark" started trading in the UK (my hosting company has been around since 2002). Like an idiot I asked them to please change their name because it could cause some confusion. Until then I'd not considered trademark issues, and we finally filed for a trademark of our own. Of course they filed 2 weeks before us, after I'd sent my polite request. So 2 years and about £20,000 later (only finished just last month) we defeated their objection to our trademark at a hearing, and the trademark office gave us full rights over the name. If it hadn't gone that way we could have been harassed into changing our 10-year old brand name, especially if we'd gone into any new areas of business.
My takeaway from that is that if I start another business I'll take on registration of the UK, EU & possibly US trademark as a given before launching. But when you're just starting out, it is (at best) thousands of pounds that could really be put to better use.
Matthew @ Bytemark Hosting
Yes, but not without mentioning that Microsoft paid off Linspire/Lindows after they challenged the Windows trademark.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
I propsose they take the name "Shminterest". Can swap my rights to it for a modest stash of Queen's portraits.
Industrial space for lease in Flatlandia.
I will never understand this line of reasoning. A big American corporation did this terrible thing in the past, and so somehow it's now ok if British company does the same thing? Weren't you just saying that it was wrong for them to do it? It seems like you started your argument by stating that you are definitely on the wrong side of it.
In the US, trademarks only extend as far as someone might be confused by their use. It's not a hard black and white line, but you can use "Word" if you wanted to, in an unrelated industry from Microsoft's, provided that nobody thought that customers might be confused and think that your product was, or was in some way related to, Microsoft's. (Obviously since Microsoft is such a big company and does so much stuff, this might be harder than if they were purely in the word processing business.)
A good example is Apple Records vs Apple Computer Corp. There was a lot of argument that went back and forth as to whether Apple Computers might be confused with Apple Records -- which seemed ridiculous at the time, because why would Apple Computer ever get into the music business? So they worked it out and came to a settlement to stay out of each other's turf. That happens very frequently. (It got interesting when Apple-the-computer-company decided to get into the music business; my understanding is that they made Apple Records an offer they couldn't refuse.)
And given how ubiquitous Microsoft's products are -- love them or hate them -- the breadth of their trademarks are probably not unreasonable. A no-name company ought not be able to assert a trademark with any similar breadth, because there's so little chance of confusion.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Not his point. At all.
Probably why they trade marked pinterest (3 syllables) vs "Premium Interest" (6 syllables). But, legalities aside [even if Pinterest is forced to change its name], the term pinterest is already poisoned for use by Premium Interest. The market already associates the term with pinterest.com. Trying to use it for another company is just adding an additional burden on Premium Interest.
Premium Interest appears to be a muddled/watered down version of reddit (2 syllables). (P)Interestingly, on the premiuminterest.com page, they have a "like" button called "Pi Score".
The smart (entrepreneurial/business/non-lawyering) way out for everybody: Sell the trademark to pinterest. Change premiuminterest.com to piscore.com (2 syllables).
Even without the trademark flap, "Premium Interest" is a lousy name for a business. Barry Diller changed askjeeves.com to ask.com. Everybody remembers Google but [virtually] nobody remembers AltaVista. Lycos? The exception that proves the rule, I guess ...
Time will tell whether Alex Hearn is half as savvy a businessman as Diller.
Like a good neighbor, fsck is there
plan one.. guys with billy clubs and rubber hoses to get this conflict "resolved" properly with the smart ass lawyers.
plan two.... get a new name, change your branding, and sink "pinterest.com" so deep in porn links it becomes utterly toxic and blocked by all the new UK porn filters!
Before everyone gets up in arms, it's worth pointing out that Sky Television (which is where "Sky" got its name from) was created in 1980 and merged with British Satellite Broadcasting in 1990 to form the company known as British Sky Broadcasting or, more simply, Sky. The company not only does TV but broadband and VoD as well.
In comparison, SkyDrive was developed and launched by Microsoft in 2007 - some 27 years later (or 17 if you only consider after the merger).
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
Yet another compelling argument against private property. We need COMMUNISM!
Gosh I'm convinced. If only Marx, Lenin, Mao, or Trotsky had such a compelling argument. I'll be voting Communist next election.
another example is "Yellow pages", the original name for NIS that was changed because British Telecom PLC owned the name "Yellow Pages" as a registered trademark in the United Kingdom. As a legacy many of the commands start with yp, for example ypinit, ypserv, etc.
Squirt Drive
No, most US citizens are slaves to whoever has the money.
Not sure if you've noticed but your famed constitution now has about same importance as toilet paper because the people in charge translate it however the fuck they like.
Toilet paper you use to clean up shit. The constitution isn't like that any more.
And if you wipe your ass with the constitution you'll (ironically) end up in gitmo
Yea, Leon Trotsky was such a swell guy. Very humble man.....[sarcasm]
Maximum rule, minimal equitability.
I was disappointed to find that the cat photos on pinterest do not display the depth of understanding of the human condition that the thought provoking plays of the great Harold Pinter so brilliantly illustrate.
pintryst
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