Facebook Says It Owns 'Book' 483
An anonymous reader writes "The Chicago Tribune is reporting that Facebook has sued a tiny start-up called Teachbook.com over the use of 'book' in its name. The start-up, which has two employees, aims to provide tools for teachers to manage their classrooms and share lesson plans and other resources. 'Effectively they're bombing a mosquito here, and we're not sure why they want to do that,' Teachbook.com co-director Greg Shrader told the Tribune. Facebook said its use of 'book' in its name is 'highly distinctive in the context of online communities and networking websites.' Facebook apparently is alleging that no other online 'network of people' can use the word 'book' in its name without violating its trademark."
____book.com sites that predate facebook... (Score:5, Informative)
Nothing compared to what they did before... (Score:5, Informative)
Teachbook appears to be a social/community website, close to the area of what Facebook does. I would think that the "teachbook" name was chosen on purpose to be "facebook for teachers/teaching". Well, you can't do that without facebook going after you. IANAL so I don't know if facebook can or should prevail, but it seems to me that they sort of have a point.
Now, contrast this to a previous action of facebook: http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/10/facebook-placebook/ [techcrunch.com]
They went after a startup travel website, i.e. a site for you to book vacations in the places you visit called... well... placebook! I mean who better for the name placebook than a site where you book... places... The site in question had, in the end, to back down and change their name to triptrace: http://blog.triptrace.com/2010/08/19/we-tell-the-world-placebook-is-now-triptrace/ [triptrace.com] . Now THAT was ridiculous.
A few more they could go after (Score:2, Informative)
http://flushaholybook.com/ [flushaholybook.com]
http://www.domesdaybook.co.uk/ [domesdaybook.co.uk]
http://www.chooseandbook.nhs.uk/ [chooseandbook.nhs.uk]
http://www.hotelbook.com/ [hotelbook.com]
http://www.thegoodbook.co.uk/ [thegoodbook.co.uk]
http://adoptabook.bl.uk/ [adoptabook.bl.uk]
http://www.easytobook.com/ [easytobook.com]
http://www.bid4abook.co.uk/ [bid4abook.co.uk]
http://www.nielsenbook.co.uk/ [nielsenbook.co.uk]
That's just a few of them.
Re:Prior Art (Score:1, Informative)
According to Facebook:
"If others could freely use 'generic plus BOOK' marks for online networking services targeted to that particular generic category of individuals, the suffix BOOK could become a generic term for 'online community/networking services' or 'social networking services,'" Facebook argued in the lawsuit. "That would dilute the distinctiveness of the Facebook Marks."
Of course, the generic suffix "book" that they speak of has long been in the "public domain"; i.e. "Year book" (from which Facebook stole the idea. In fact Facebook used to only be available to people with school-based email addresses). Then there are the other historic generics like textbook, flip book, scrap book, etc and so on.
Too bad that in these cases the courts tend to rule in favour of the rich and famous instead of the fair. People with "Mc" in their names are screwed if they want to start ANY type of business (restaurant or not) because McDonald's has always been an asshole about the issue, and the courts have favoured the asshole. With Nissan [nissan.com] things are better, but the legal costs and time (in years, going through the court system) have been horrendous.
In summary: if you're poor your screwed. If you can afford millions of dollars for lawyers then you may be able to get your way.
The domain is only up since 2007 (Score:2, Informative)
Domain Name: TEACHBOOK.COM
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.enom.com
Referral URL: http://www.enom.com/ [enom.com]
Name Server: NS1.M446.SGDED.COM
Name Server: NS2.M446.SGDED.COM
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Updated Date: 12-mar-2010
Creation Date: 29-jan-2007
Expiration Date: 29-jan-2011
Re:reading it wrong. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Give Me A Break! (Score:5, Informative)
Given that teachbook is a social networking site but for a specialized niche, I think it's fair to say that they are doing that.
If you go to http://www.uspto.gov/ [uspto.gov] and search for "book" you get over 9.000 results, including hankybook, partybook, planbook mobook. I'm pretty sure this [uspto.gov] is FB's record. Their description of services pretty much covers the earth, moon and stars online. It seems overly broad, even including peer-to-browser photo sharing services namely, providing a website featuring technology enabling users to upload, view and download digital photos. I'm not sure how it got through without being narrowed.
Normally there's a reference that says it's not an attempt to trademark a generic word (like "book") but I don't see that in FB's app. Probably because their mark is FACEBOOK and not FACE BOOK. I'm not entirely sure, I've only been through the process a couple times.
Seems like a stretch to me. If their name was "teacherfacebook", then I'd side with FB. But trying to trademark "book" in the context of any online collection of individuals seems way out of line. Since one could argue that online repositories are merely a modern evolution of books, then you're basically letting FB trademark the world.
54 matches in /usr/share/dict... (Score:4, Informative)
There are 54 matches in /usr/share/dict, though facebook isn't one of them.
$ grep .book$ /usr/share/dict/words | xargs echo
bankbook blankbook bluebook boobook cabook casebook cashbook chapbook checkbook classbook cookbook copybook daybook doombook dopebook guidebook handbook handybook herdbook hornbook hymnbook jestbook landbook lawbook logbook matchbook needlebook notebook outbook overbook passbook playbook pocketbook pollbook promptbook rebook roadbook schoolbook scorebook scrapbook shopbook sketchbook songbook spaebook storybook studbook stylebook talebook textbook tithebook waybook wordbook workbook yearbook
Books.com - Barnse and Noble 1992 (Score:3, Informative)
Beats Facebook (1997) by 5 years - so according to Facebook's logic, Barnes and Noble are the REAL owners, and Facebook has to change their name
Domain Name.......... books.com
Creation Date........ 1992-10-09
Registration Date.... 2009-09-27
Expiry Date.......... 2010-11-20
Organisation Name.... barnesandnoble.com llc
Organisation Address. 76 Ninth Avenue, 9th Floor
Organisation Address. 76 9th Avenue, 9th floor
Organisation Address. New York
Organisation Address. 10011
Organisation Address. NY
Organisation Address. UNITED STATES
Admin Name........... Paul Karatzas
Admin Address........ 76 Ninth Avenue, 9th Floor
Admin Address........
Admin Address........ New York
Admin Address........ 10011
Admin Address........ NY
Admin Address........ UNITED STATES
Admin Email.......... domainadmin@BOOK.COM
Admin Phone.......... +1.2124146000
Admin Fax............ +1.2124146150
Tech Name............ Paul Karatzas
Tech Address......... 76 Ninth Avenue, 9th Floor
Tech Address.........
Tech Address......... New York
Tech Address......... 10011
Tech Address......... NY
Tech Address......... UNITED STATES
Tech Email........... domainadmin@BOOK.COM
Tech Phone........... +1.2124146000
Tech Fax............. +1.2124146150
Name Server.......... NS4.BARNESANDNOBLE.COM
Name Server.......... NS3.BARNESANDNOBLE.COM
Name Server.......... MAIL9TH1.BARNESANDNOBLE.COM
Name Server.......... NS2.BARNESANDNOBLE.COM
Actually... (Score:5, Informative)
In my experience, a directory/book for private high schools and colleges which shows a head-shot of each student and faculty member, gives their address on campus and their home address, has been called a "Facebook" for a long time. And seeing as Facebook was originally open to only .edu users, I'm pretty sure that was the idea.
That's what it was called at the school I attended in the early 90's anyway.
Re:Give Me A Break! (Score:3, Informative)
Precedents are often set by cases like this, ie: a large organisations attacking a tiny outfit who cannot possibly afford to defend themselves. It's not just corporations that do it, unions have also learnt to attack a small shop so as to set a precendent they can then use against the big boys.
Re:Books.com - Barnse and Noble 1992 (Score:3, Informative)
I just sent an email to Teachbook, with the prior registration of Books.com by B&N, as well as the info that B&N bought the domain book.com (which was also registered prior to Facebook.com) back in 1998.
Since Facebook has already stipulated in their lawsuit that similar names are infringing and cause economic damage, they have already buried themselves legally. Good. The sooner facebook dies, the better off the rest of the world will be.
Die, facebook, die!
Re:Give Me A Break! (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Give Me A Break! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Books.com - Barnse and Noble 1992 (Score:3, Informative)
Trademarks don't work like that. Barnes & Noble isn't exactly an online social network; they're a bookseller. Since they're considered to be in different businesses, under law there is no conflict.
Also, there is no concept of "prior art" in trademarks. If, for example, I have a registered trademark that I've used to identify my business, and I've used it successfully in commerce, it doesn't really matter whether or not you used the same thing or something similar first; I may still be able to successfully sue you after issuing you a cease and desist.
IANAL, etc.
Re:Give Me A Break! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Give Me A Break! (Score:3, Informative)
When you say a term is or isn't "geenric", you need to consider context. Trademarks cover words that had prior meanings all the time. Apple (the computer company) chose an exiting, generic term for their computers; but they brought the term into the context of computing equipment, and they rightly control its use in that context. Same goes for Facebook.
Suppose Facebook did start buildnig specialized sites for different groups. How do you suppose they might name them? Or the more directly relevant question: How is soemone first hearing about Teachbook supposed to know that isn't exactly what happened? That's precisely the type of confusion trademarks are designed to avoid; you specifically cannot attract business by creating the impression that you're affiliated with me (unless you are).
Did Teachbook choose that name as a derivation from the colloquial term for a yearbook? No. If not for facebook(.com)'s use of the term, the name would never have even occured to Teachbook. So it's not like you can argue that Facebook is trying to carve out some wide swath of namespace that people naturally would've wanted to use.
Re:Give Me A Break! (Score:2, Informative)
Should Apple sue Intel over their i7 Core stuff? And every other iStuff product? Come to think of it, yes. I'd like that. Maybe then all the retarded iNames would be gone.
Actually, Intel used the "i" prefix long before Apple did... It all started when Intel tried to sue AMD for using "80386" as the name of their processor. Intel couldn't trademark a number, so they changed the name of the processor to "i386" This was before Apple had and products with the "i" prefix...
In fact, in my lab, I have a Cisco VoIP product that was sold as an "iPhone"... This product was also made before Apple released an iPhone. In fact Cisco sued Apple over the use of the iPhone trademark, as Cisco owns and used that trademark since 2000 after acquiring InfoGear.
Yes, not the yearbook (Score:4, Informative)
It's not the yearbook, it's the book of incoming freshmen released at the start of school. It makes it easy to, for example, figure out the last name of the hottie you met yesterday by looking up all the girls named "Lisa" and seeing which one looks like the one you remember. It often even has a first name index to make finding people you've just met easier.
Common at small colleges / liberal arts schools across the US.