It was the wrong thread

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Adder

Link didn't work, but presumably you meant to link to something like this.

I know nothing about this area of law, but this doesn't seem like a good result. Moreover, I really don't see how there could be confusion (at least if that means the customer could reasonably think the buyer is the mark holder) because no one other than the buyer and google would even know that the "mark" was in use.

it's a very clean decision-

someone searches for Binder & Binder and a link pops up to D- it's unclear that it isn't Binder & Binder and there is evidence that D sought to increase the confusion. in fact the only reason D bought the thing is because it wants confusion-

I don't know what the last clause on your post means, but the customer used the mark Binder & Binder. em knows that's the firm it wants to consult with, and the ad-link confused em.

The Playboy (lots of early internet cases involve porn sites- go figure) v. Netscape case seems to give a way out for allowing a link, but only if the link makes clear it is not to the mark holder's (here Binder & Binder) page.


there is a great playboy case that involved the equivalent of our "white text" battle- a porn site had it's home page full of the word "playboy" hundreds of times but it wasn't visible to people as it was "white text." The D argued no one could see it- but the way search engines worked (at least then) was to count the number of hits on a page. so a search for "Playboy" would put the porn site above Playboy in the results. It's fascinating to think about the technology, and the consumer-psychology involved in the porn site's plan.