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Court Tells Disney to Pull Go.com Logo
dkh2 writes "Today on ZDNet: A U.S. District Court has denied a request by Disney, InfoSeek and others to stay a preliminary injunction against their familiar green and yellow logo. The injunction orders Disney to remove the logo immediately from all broadcast and internet media and gives them 60 days to remove it from other more solid forms." And Disney/Infoseek has started to comply. You can see the change at Go.com right now.
I've never looked at either of the two web sites, but seeing on of the logos on TV (ESPN or ABC I think), I always associated the two. I never noticed the distinction between GoTO.com and go.com. Now, I'll have to investigate what goto.com is all about. Free advertising. Then again, I guess the lawyers aren't all that free.
~afniv
"Man könnte froh sein, wenn die Luft so rein wäre wie das Bier"
~afniv
"Man könnte froh sein, wenn die Luft so rein wäre wie das Bier"
Richard von Weizs
When I saw the headline, for a fleeting moment I had a vision:
Mickey Mouse, shorts around his ankles, being spanked over Janet Reno's knee.
Didn't Go.com's 'Executive-Vice-Weenie' type get busted for interstate traffiking in kiddie porn?
.sig: Now legally binding!
I'll start off the lists...
Similarities:
Differences:
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Sure, they're obviously different - when you put them side by side. Trouble is, that would rarely happen on a website or any other medium. The design elements (rectangular yellow border, green circle, white lettering of 'GO', hell, the font is the EXACT same) are such that Disney's version could indeed cause confusion, if only one logo is seen.
People rarely consciously 'see' advertising anymore (what ad banners have you seen during your current surfing session? Name them all, the companies and products they're pitching, please. See?) - it's all taken in as vague patterns, and used to recognise or remember a certain item later when it's seen again. Guaranteed, if you walked past 30 billboards in a day, each with one or the other of those logos in the corner, at the end of the day, you would *not* be able to tell how many of each there were - all you would remember would be a square border, green circle, and something about 'GO' in it... and the associations you make with the logo and the content of the boards may not be something that GoTo.com wants you to make.
That's what all this is about. Consider - it wouldn't be any different from the GoTo/Disney situation if I came up with a logo that had a very realistic-looking burger bun surrounding the words 'Burger Town' in the Burger King colors and font. I'd get my ass sued off, and rightfully so.
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
Here's a useful overview of the law surrounding trademark confusion. I recommend that Slashdotters read it before posting uninformed opinions.
It's not mentioned here, but there's a new law (the Trademark Anti Dilution Act of 1999) addressing this issue, that gives more protection to so-called "famous marks". This has been cited before in regards to domain names, which seems to be one of its main thrusts.
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lake effect weblog
{Network engineer in Chicago--looking for work!}
It sounds like an urban myth, but in this case it actually happened. Here's a
news storywith links to others.
--
"L'IT c'est moi!"