Lindows Takes a Hit in the Netherlands

diersing writes "The Register has the latest on it. Resellers of the Linux distribution Lindows in the Netherlands were ordered today to stop selling the product. Amsterdam judge Rullmann agreed with Microsoft that in many ways Lindows is 'profiting from the success of Windows' by infringing on Microsoft's trademarks." This seems to be a rather common occurrence lately.

Different Site

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm going to start visiting that site Blashdot.org

They had it coming

[Kieckerjan]

Although I detest this verdict, I cannot say Lindows didn't have it coming. The name is a deliberate gamble. And when you gamble, you win some and you lose some. They won a lot free publicity all around the globe. Now they lost a case. Big deal. It's all in the game.

Re:TRanslated from dutch website

[storem]

Also the judge ruled that Lindows must ensure that internet users from the Benelux [BElgium NEtherlands LUXembourg] can no longer access the site www.lindows.com.

Not that I'm that patriotic or anything, but how on earth can a Dutch judge restrict my ability (I'm Belgian citizen) to visit a particular website (even if it is www.lindows.com) by obliging the owner to deny me access?

There are no court agreements between the Benelux countries in my opinion, at least a Belgian judge should rule in the same way as the Dutch one to make this ligitimate. This would be different if this ruling was made in the EU (European Union) court in Strassbourg, whose rulings supersede Belgian ones.

Re:Seriously..

[Liselle]

There is no "they", there is the Lindows CEO, Michael Robertson. This is the guy who funded the XBOX hacking contest. Any opportunity he has to piss in Microsoft's Cheerios, he will take.

Re:Seriously..

[xlyz]

as previously discussed [slashdot.org] lindows brand name in english speaking countries is defendable, as windows being a common word is not.

of course this does not apply where english is not the main language, and windows then become a fully defendable brand.

M$ is just taking advantage of this (where it can)

Why is everybody so upset by this?

[Monkey Overlord]

Why is everybody so upset by this? The fact that Microsoft is evil, does not mean they are wrong going after Lindows.
Lindows tries to emulate MS Windows' look, functionality and even the name. What's worse is that it is not doing any of those things very well either.
I don't see why Lindows is even out there. What purpose does it serve? Are they trying to confuse people to switch to Linux? I can see how something like that could happen to some Joe-Sixpack who goes to a store sees Lindows OS v.XX on the shelves and thinks it the new version of XP. Also, I can see why someone would want to emulate Windows API to run applications ... makes sense considering that a lot of software is not available for Linux. But the look and the name just don't make sense. If the GUI is the user's problem, he/she should not be using Linix anyways. Jesus, if you are too stupid to figure out which one is the "close window" button in KDE because you are so used to Windows ... you are too dumb, don't reproduce, pick up smoking and drinking and use MS Windows for the rest of your natural life.

Lindows is still around??

[dkode]

I was never really a fan of lindows mainly due to the fact that when it was originally starting to surface, Michael said that it would support the whole microsoft office suite as well as run ANY microsoft program

It seems like he used those comments just to generate publicity. Once again it seems like he has generated publicity.

Oh well...hand me my Debian cd.

Re:"profiting from the success of " Linux/Unix

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems to me that Open Office [openoffice.org] is trading on the success of Microsoft Office.

This could get interesting.

Windows generic

[RAMMS+EIN]

``arguing that the term "Windows" is generic for a GUI-based operating system''

I think this makes a lot of sense. Windows is a regular English word, and therefore there is a good argument against it being trademarkable. If it were an acronym, there would be a point, but as it stands, I think the trademark should be invalidated, at least in English-speaking countries.

X Lindows

[totierne]

Or would MIT and apple complain?
How did Microsoft Windows get a trademark on Windows, is it that different to X Windows?

Re:Seriously..

[Rallion]

Right. It's an attempt to use Windows' popularity by having a similar name. Which you can't do.

Re:Seriously..

[aardvarkjoe]

Of course. The point is that nobody's claiming that you can't use the word "window" to talk about the interface. (If that was the case, then Microsoft would be suing people over the X Window System.) It's when you use it to name an operating system that it becomes a valid trademark, because that's not a domain in which it's used generically.

Re:Sure...

[Anonymous Coward]

I can see the masses of confused customers who have bought Lindows by accident because they were not aware that Lindows and Windows are not the same kind of software. Yeah right...
The few to hear the word "Lindows" are all pretty familiar with both Windows and Lindows

So what's next? Whatabout suing WinZip, WinAmp, WinCVS etc ?