Welcome to Patents and Trademarks Guide
Filing For Patents Article
This is a selection made from among articles on Filing For Patents. For a permanent link to this article, or to bookmark it for future reading, click here.
Yahoo to Prohibit Competitive Keyword Bids Containing Trademarks
from: Otilia Otlacan
Yahoo Search Marketing (searchmarketing.yahoo.com) has recently announced its advertisers of a new policy to be implemented as of March 1st 2006, concerning the use of trademarks within their products and services *.
Under the new policy, no reference to a trademark can be made (except for ads placed by the trademark owners themselves, obviously), and consequently no bids can be make for keywords containing such trademarks. Exceptions refer to usage of trademarks in non-competitive ads, such as those made by re-sellers, or in informative (and still non-competitive) ads.
The previous policy allowed references to competitors' trademarks and comparisons as long as they were "objective and informative" - the formulation makes me cringe, as it is clearly troublesome trying to evaluate one’s objectivity when speaking of business competitors. As for the "informative" side of it… the probability for someone to actually PAY for an ad to be informative of someone else’s product/service, that’s as believable just like the existence of Santa Claus.
It is really good to see Yahoo making a big step forward in regulating abuse and misuse of trademarks, even though that probably translates in some revenue loss for them, by having certain advertisers migrate to a "friendlier" place such as Google. According to Google's policies, "[...] advertisers may select trademarked terms as keywords or use them in the content of the ad. As a provider of space for advertisements, Google is not in a position to arbitrate trademark disputes between advertisers and trademark owners. As stated in our Terms and Conditions, advertisers are responsible for the keywords and ad text that they choose to use. Accordingly, Google encourages trademark owners to resolve their disputes directly with the advertiser, particularly because the advertiser may have similar ads on other sites. However, as a courtesy to trademark owners, Google is willing to perform a limited investigation of reasonable complaints."
The question is why would Yahoo change its policies and apparently offer Google an even bigger bite from the SEM cake? It is way too early to say now, and their official explanation is not entirely believable: Yahoo states to have had the users' best interest in mind, by providing them with a better experience when searching terms that contain trademarks. Though this would make a laudable initiative with a good PR potential, experts know the search market is driven by large publishers and advertisers and not by the little surfing guys. Numerous speculations can be made: threats of large legal actions from trademark owners, pressure from certain groups of interests are among the most vehiculated ones.
However, a more plausible one is that Yahoo makes preparations for a much larger scale movement destined to influence the market in a manner we cannot anticipate just yet.
Until further industry news, there's one thing to rejoice: from now on, no "better than Botox" ads on Yahoo and their partner sites!
* - the products and services covered by the new policy are: Sponsored Search, Local Advertising, Search Submit, Product Submit, Travel Submit and Directory Submit.
About The Author
Otilia Otlacan is a certified professional with expertise in e-Marketing, currently working as independent consultant and publisher. She publishes www.TeaWithEdge.com (Marketing portal), has recently launched www.MarketingWHO.com, a professional Marketing Directory, and blogs at http://marketing-journal.teawithedge.com.
Filing For Patents News
Oprah Sued For Patent Infringement Over Her Book Club - Tech Dirt
Joe Mullin is back to let us know about the latest patent insanity, starting with a post about a whole bunch of patent infringement lawsuits based on patents held by Scott Harris. You may recall Harris because he was a lawyer for a big law firm, but ...
Read more...Apple patents an iGlove for chilly iPhone users - Daily Telegraph
Many customers in chillier climes - particularly Canada and northern areas of the US have expressed annoyance that their touch-screen iPhones do not work properly when wearing gloves. In response, the company has submitted designs for an "iGlove" at ...
Read more...Symantec, Microsoft, AVG and 22 other companies sued for security ... - TG Daily
Harrison County (Texas) - On December 30, an entity calling itself "Information Protection and Authentication of Texas, LLC" (IPAT) filed a complaint in federal district court alleging that 25 security companies have infringed on two of its patents ...
Read more...Facet Biotech chief business officer ‘terminated’ - San Jose Business Journal
Redwood City’s Facet Biotech Corp. — recently spun off from PDL BioPharma Inc. — will part with its chief business officer Friday. Facet (NASDAQ: FACTV) said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that on Monday it “determined to ...
Read more...Saxon Innovations Files Complaint in International Trade Commission - Consumer Electronics Net
TYLER, Texas , Jan. 5 /PRNewswire/ -- Saxon Innovations, LLC ("Saxon") today announced it has requested that the International Trade Commission commence an investigation of patent infringement against five electronic manufacturers relating to the ...
Read more...Cellectis Terminates Genoway’s License under Its Homologous ... - Genetic Engineering News
Biocitech - Cellectis S.A. (NYSE – Euronext: ALCLS), the genome engineering company, announces having terminated the non-exclusive license it had granted to Genoway S.A. in 2001 for certain uses of homologous recombination. The termination is ...
Read more...Patent office to hire 1,500 staff - Economic Times
NEW DELHI: The Indian Patent Office will hire 1,500 people to deal with the increase in applications seeking exclusive rights for innovations, a senior government official said on Tuesday. "We are hiring a few hundred in the first tranche," Secretary ...
Read more...