Friday, April 04, 2008
Domain Bidding on Trial
A federal appeals court is considering whether or not Google's policy of allowing competitors to bid on trademarked names is a violation of trademark law.This could go either way, and whichever way it goes now would likely result in an appeal to the Supreme Court. While MS and Yahoo don't allow bidding on domain names or trademarks, Google continues to allow the practice and make lots of money doing so.
Should people who search for Nike.com or Zicam be presented with ads from competitors? I would argue that advertising based on trademarked names is a "use in commerce," which is the precedent that the judges must rule on. Google's service is undeniably commerce, so it fails that test. However, my limited legal knowledge believes that there is wiggle room for judges to rule otherwise through their own interpretation, so we'll see.
Via MediaPost.
Posted By John Gartner at 09:28 AM
Permanent Link: Domain Bidding on Trial
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