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Iceland is Suing a Supermarket That's Using Its Name (cnn.com)
In a case which could puzzle copyright, trademark, and intellectual property offices, Iceland (the country) is not happy with a Britain supermarket chain, which is also called Iceland. From a CNN report:On Friday, Iceland, the country, took legal action against Iceland (the retailer), saying its enforcement of a trademark has prevented local firms from marketing their products using the name. Iceland Foods holds a Europe-wide trademark for the name Iceland, which it has been trading under for 46 years. "Iceland Foods has aggressively pursued and won multiple cases against Icelandic companies which use 'ICELAND' in their representation or as part of their trademark, even in cases when the products and services do not compete," the government said in a statement. The Icelandic government is now asking the European Union Intellectual Property Office to invalidate the trademark.
If you took the effort to read the intro, you'll know.
NOT from Iceland here, but probably they are upset about the fact that the store branding is "Iceland" and not something like "Iceland foods", and, as the article states, that the food store has prevented other non-conflicting uses of "Iceland" in brand names.
The result is that companies that are actually based in Iceland cannot call themselves "Iceland widgets" or something similar.
Imagine if there were a US company called "Canada" that sold food and was able to stop Canada Computers from using "Canada" in its name.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
It's right there in the summary why they care.
Iceland Foods has been going after all kinds of companies from Iceland that try to setup shop in the EU using Iceland in their own company names. Iceland Foods is claiming trademark ownership over the word "Iceland" as used in the EU. Meaning, any Icelandic companies that try to get a foothold in the EU need to change the name they operate under or face a lawsuit from Iceland Foods.
And Iceland Foods is not related to the country of Iceland in any way, shape, or form.
Personally, I hope the Icelandic government prevails, and forces Iceland Foods to change their name to Ice Land Foods, thus allowing all their Icelandic companies to pay homage to their homeland in their new Iceland X company names. :)
You need to read better then. It is clearly explained that Iceland (the country) reacts because Iceland (the company) is suing Icelandic companies who try to sell their products in the EU, and using Iceland in product names or descriptions.
Because Iceland the country actually seems to have a vested interest in making sure their citizens can use their own country's name in business ventures. What a novel idea, a country looking out for its citizens...
The crux of this case is that Iceland The Country is saying Iceland the Supermarket are being dicks and suing or threatening Icelandic citizens and businesses for having commercial ventures with the name Iceland in the name.
To use your own example, suppose there was a US supermarket named Canada, that was threatening Canada Computers with a cease and desist and forcing them to change their name.
On the substantive point of the trademark infringement, I had the impression that if you don't defend a trademark then you lose it. Iceland have been displaying their name in huge illuminated signs all over the UK for decades so how the Country can now come along and act shocked I can't imagine.
It's not the defense itself that's the important part. If you don't defend a trademark and it's used more and more to refer to things other than those you're selling, you risk the trademark becoming a generic term for... well, refrigerated food in this case, but w/e. The law cares only minimally about the amount of vigor with which you've defended the trademark against genericity; the important thing is whether it's still a trademarkable word or not. In this case, "Iceland" isn't used by anyone as a generic term, so the genericity stuff doesn't come into play.
What might come into play is "laches", the legal doctrine that if Iceland-the-country has let Iceland-the-store spend decades opening stores and advertising and building brand awareness, it's no longer equitable for a judge to simply take the trademark away from Iceland-the-store. IANAL and I certainly ANA international trademark L, though, so it's possible that laches cannot bar this claim.
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The country isn't claiming that the supermarket can't use the name, they are defending other businesses that use Iceland in their names from being threatened and sued by the supermarket.
Iceland the retailer seems to think it has to stop all other businesses using Iceland in any context. Iceland the country it's upset because it makes it hard for Icelandic businesses to operate in Europe, even when they aren't supermarkets or likely to be confused with the British retailer.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
The oddest thing about Iceland (the frozen goods supermarket) is that, despite it being several hundred years younger than Iceland (the nation), you only have to briefly rummage around in the bottom of one of their freezers to discover goods which pre-date by hundreds of years the LandnÃmabÃk (the settlement of Iceland begun in 874 AD).
And they taste yummy!
Try again.
1) The lawsuit was over Icesave, not over the failure of the three banks.
2) Icesave was a savings program created by Landsbankinn backed by a private fund as the primary insurer.
3) The secondary insurer was the government of the respective area that the customers were from - Iceland was the secondary insurer in Iceland, the UK government in the UK, and the Dutch government in the Netherlands.
4) When the market crashed, the private fund went bankrupt. This passed insurance responsibility to the secondary insurers.
5) Iceland paid Icelanders, as the secondary insurer for the Icelandic market, up to the insured limit. They later passed a bill paying out the full value of the accounts to Icelandic customers.
6) The UK and Dutch governments, however, tried to shirk their responsibilities as the secondary insurers in their respective markets, and instead tried to blackmail Iceland into insuring it for them. A great deal of pressure was put on Iceland on a wide variety of fronts, ranging from EU negotiations to emergency loans to fisheries.
7) The then-government commenced negotiations and came up with a bill to pay the majority of the UK and Netherlands' responsibilities, to try to be able to put it behind them and get the economy back on track. Our president rejected it, which put it to referendum. The public overwhelmingly rejected it.
8) The next government used the failure to try to negotiate a better deal and got one for reduced, but still extremely painful covering of the UK and Netherlands' liabilities. Again it was vetoed, and again the public rejected it, although not by as large of a margin.
9) The UK and Netherlands decided that this wasn't going anywhere, so took us to the EFTA court.
10) The EFTA court reviewed the case, and found in our favour on all counts. The UK and Netherlands did bear responsibility as the secondary insurers and not Iceland. As is standard, all of the costs of all of the litigation additionally fell on them.
Wingus, Dingus! Listen up!
I agree, and I hope the country wins. After all, what moron allowed a company to trademark the name of a country they don't own?
On the other hand Iceland the supermarket is based in England, and what is spoken in England is English without any qualification. What the rest of the world speeks can be qualified as American English, Canadian English etc. but imposing that requirement on English people is a extremely insulting.
When you say 'Europeanese' you mean 'English', though you're right that the word or close variants appear in many European languages. When you say 'wholesale' you mean 'retail'. When you say 'mall' you mean 'shop'. But aside from that, your sentence was correct.
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If you don't want your investment account to be backed with a private fund as the primary insurer, then... wait for it.... don't invest in an account with a private fund as the primary insurer. It was literally one click away from the front page describing Icesave accounts, clearly labeled. This wasn't some secret, you can't pretend, "Oh, I had no idea it was a private fund that was the primary backer!" It was right there in plain English, not even remotely hidden.
Private funds are subject to the state of the market. In a financial crash, private funds can crash. Duh. I hope this fact isn't news to you. And that's what happened when a crash hit. What should have happened next was secondary insurers paying the bills they were responsible for, not trying to blackmail a tiny country into paying it for them.
I'll repeat: if you don't want your money in an account backed by a private fund as the primary insurer, don't put your money into an account backed by a private fund as the primary insurer. And don't make BS excuses for your secondary insurer not paying. The UK and Netherlands had no objection to the insurance structure until after the crash. Well, waaaaah, if you had a problem with it, you had nearly two years to register an objection to it.
They lost on all counts in court, and for good reason. Hopefully they'll remember that next time that they decide to try to use blackmail to get out of paying their bills. Oh, and declaring Icelandic entities to be terrorists didn't exactly win you any friends here, either.
Wingus, Dingus! Listen up!