If 'App Store' trademark is generic, so is Microsoft's 'Windows,' Apple argues - Page 2

Bingo. Nail, head, hit.

Actually, it's not. Just about every modern operating system implements a graphical user interface, and almost every graphical user interface is designed around a "window" system.

Mac OS, Unix/Linux (most distributions), NeXTstep, Amiga OS, BE OS, [...] all have basic user-visible interface elements that are referred to as "windows". Even iOS has "windows", even if they always full screen...

So, "window" is a generic term that applies to most operating systems...

I don't think the issue is about who first coined the term or whether it is a new term. The issue seems to be that Microsoft now think the term has become so generic as a means to identify a particular thing that it can't be trademarked.

My ignorance of trademark law is boundless, but to use IBM in this conversation is of no value.

Who did you say was the detractor? not me, shirley

No way! I want MS to always get better, and bring us better stuff, so that companies like Apple respond with even BETTER stuff.

Why don't clueless Apple fanboys understand the success of other companies is good for everyone!?

Well done, but I have to say it was easy to win that argument

No, it's designed around a SCREENED system, with different screens for different functions.

The whole point of picking "Windows" as a name was that it was like opening a window to a new experience with each screen. As I said before, even today many people still refer to each window as a screen (mainly the old guys I work with who have been in IT for many many years.)

So "Windows" is a creative term used to differentiate a specific operating system.

If apple called their store the "iOS app store" and Microsoft called it the same, then obviously this would all make sense

Don't let your bias cloud your reasoning. "Apps" may have been used before, but can you point to me any publication that has coined the term, "App Store" before Apple did? And, even if someone did, the original creator of the term "App Store" protected it with a trademark?

If not, then a company can do so within a given time period, and prevent others from using the same term. That is the essence and intent of Trademark laws in the US and many countries.



So, if it was plain and simple, and not creative, why then does the more creative Microsoft object to its exclusive use by Apple, since no one has trademark it yet?



Read the phrasing again: " Your happiness, and the detractors...."

That you are not lumped as a single group, is a recognition (or at least my understanding of your post I responded to is that you may supportive rather than a detractor... like chronster, LuisDias, etc.

CGC

Ha ha! Pretty funny. Well, you're all right, to some degree, and all wrong, to another. You're all just too young, apparently, to know the history of the word "App" and how it came into common usage.

Apple did indeed coin the term "application," or "app" for short. But it wasn't for the iPhone. It was in the early 1980's for the Lisa computer, and subsequently used it for the Macintosh too. At that time most people in the industry used the term "program," or other terms which are now completely archaic, to describe what we know today as an "App." I know, because i was writing software before Apple was even founded.

Incidentally, it was Apple or more accurately Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak - who coined the term Personal Computer, or PC for short. Ironic, since it was IBM which popularized, and M$ which subsequently usurped it.

We're not all clueless, but you are dead-on. Competition is the "American Way" - or used to be.

True. But probably not relevant. Perhaps it is better put this way: if Microsoft tried to trademark the term "Operating System" it is would likely fail. Whilst windows are typically a characteristic of an operating system (but not universal) it does not describe the operating system itself, unlike in the case of Apple's App Store, where the trademark being applied is arguably descriptive. Trademarks by definition must distinguish one thing from it competitors in the same market.

As noted previously, only clueless people would think that the term, "Application" is new. It is the new term "App Store" and the right of Apple to trademark the aforementioned term that is being contested here.

If you are aware of any publication that used the term, "App Store" before Apple did, please enlighten us.

And, to reiterate a previous point, unless someone has already trademarked the term, Apple is within its right to do so.


CGC

... added Apple, "So suck it."

You mean Apple!

Like others have said, windows although an existing word isn't being used for the same meaning. Whereas app and store are so therefore its no different to someone trying to trademark the name tv store or shoe store, which sounds ridiculous.

However in the UK our largest retailer of games is called "game" which too is very generic. So I would say its ok if you can show its recognised as only being yours which in this instance I don't think they can.

'App' (capitalized) has something to do with the name of the company, surely?

As far as I am concerned, the others can call theirs the Goo Store, the Micro Store, the Sam Store......

Apple may have pioneered a concept, but it is so broad as to be un-trademarkable. App Stores are clearly the model that others will use. I do not think Apple can trademark this linguistic concept, even if they did originally develop it. An app store is a conceptual thing that can easily refer to any company. Similar, indeed, to a "window." Apple is trying to trademark a generic noun.

Not correct, as far as US trademark laws are concerned. Terms can become used, widely, e.g, Google, as in Google it, pretty quick quickly.

Because applications for patents and trademarks take time to review and approve -- it is the time, when the application for trademark application has been made, and whether the term has been generic before that ... that matters.

To my knowledge, unless you can prove otherwise, the term "App Store" is not in wide use before Apple filed its trademark application. It does not matter if "App" and "Store" are generic terms.

If the term, "App Store" has been generic before the time of the trademark application, the first reviewer would have rejected it offhand. To my knowledge, during the first review stage, the application is not made public. At least, in the case of patents, the application is not made public until a final decision has been made by the patent office.


What we think is not what matters in this issue, it is how the US Patent law reviewers decide whether the term "App Store" was generic before Apple filed its application.





Your reasoning is contradicted by the fact that "Windows" was trademarked. And, as noted by others, can you point to me a publication that would prove the term "Apple Store" was in wide use (generic) before Apple applied for the trademark protectection?

CGC

Apple is not generically used within the computer industry.

Now windows...

Well, there's a first time for everything, i suppose.


Considering that M$ has always copied others, and never really originated anything themselves, it would be a first if they ever inspired Apple.


Oh, we understand the concept. It's just has never applied to M$. In fact, it can be argued that M$, by trying to spread their monopolistic hold over the computer world, has done exactly the opposite. They literally plunged the world of technology into the dark ages in the 1990s. Finally, the long, dark winter is over, and creativity is blooming once again. And that revolution is being led by Apple.

The only innovation M$ has ever shown is how to stifle competition, or how to make poor quality knock-offs of the hard work of other companies.

I always chuckle when some says M$ is innovative.


Of course Apple used the term Windows in this regard well before M$ copied the Mac OS and brought M$ Windows to the market.


If you're saying "operating system" is synonymous with WIndows, you are mistaken. But if you're saying M$ Windows is an example of an operating system, as is Mac OS X, Linux, Unix, VMS, RSTS/11, etc., then you are correct.

An operating system is that layer of software which controls the hardware, and allocates resources. In modern years, it tends to include application frameworks and other APIs. Strictly speaking, it's not about a user interface (although in recent years, many people perceive it to be just that).

For once I disagree with Apple and agree with Windows. I think that App Store is too generic and that Windows, while potentially generic for windowed OSes in the 80s, is so set and trademarked that if Apple had an issue with it then they should have said something. Now if Apple were to call the iApp Store and MS took issue with it Id say Apple would have a case, not MS.

i strongly suspect you forgot the term killer app in the context it was used several decades ago.

anyways, the real issue is the trademark filing of 'App Store' as it pertains to a service from which people can purchase software products.

As far as I know the first use of graphical user interface utilizing the word window to describe the windowing environment was Smalltalk - 1972.

There's nothing creative about the term window. It was already in use when Windows was first introduced. Your argument holds as much water as me saying "computers don't run apps, they run programs and apps and application are creative terms". As an example, the w and x window systems were introduced before Windows 1 and a long time before Windows 3.1 when it went mainstream.

Microsoft may have popularized the term, but they didn't invent it. If they can trademark Microsoft Windows, Apple can probably trademark App Store too.

Edit: mstone has an even earlier example than mine. I just found mine through wiki searching.

@ entire article.

A brilliant rebuttal by pointing out a solid chunk of hypocrisy and mixing in some common sense.

this, by far, is the most sensible post i will ever see in this thread.

if anyone remember, program on Atari ST (GEM) first have extension .prg, later in 90ties usual extension was .app

I agree with this, except that were not talking terms that sprouted up around the same time. MS is, IMO, refuting this usage within a decent time frame while I dont think Apple ever refuted the generalization of the term Windows, but if were going to go down that route we have to through in Word and Pages which neither company seems to have a problem with.

Absolutely, 100% wrong.

Microsoft has trademarked 'Windows" in the class of goods 'computer software'. Look at Microsoft's own page:
http://www.microsoft.com/About/Legal...e/Windows.aspx

They do NOT use "Microsoft Windows" on this page, but rather use 'Windows", "windows 95", "Windows XP" and so on.

In fact, the site specifically says:
"Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and other countries."

Please stop spreading lies.

But the people to whom i was responding were.


No, some were suggesting that App is too generic to be trademarked. But in fact, Apple coined the term, so they would have a right to argue that it isn't a generic term. Please try to follow the discussion.


WTF? Apple coined the term App. If anybody has a right to trademark App Store, it's Apple.


Apple's point - indeed the whole point of this article - is that the same logic applies to the term Windows.

Remember Apple popularized the term Windows with respect to UI long ago, before M$ ever developed their "Windows" OS.

Nah, actually this is a fail on your part. It's not your fault that your wrong, but it is your fault that you didn't even bother to take a second to look it up before you spouted off.

You argue that windows is a generic term for a computer window, but fail to realise that Apple came out with such a system before Microsoft.

You say people used the term "app" before the app store without knowing that it comes from "application bundle" on Steve Jobs' other computer system NeXT step where the executables (which was what everyone mostly called apps in those days), ended with a *.app extension.

I'm not going to bother going on. Suffice to say you are pretty much wrong across the board here. Apple basically invented the term and was the first to use it. They also invented the term "App Store" and trademarked it. This is as close to a black and white, open and shut case as these things generally get.

Oddly enough Microsoft was unable to trademark "Windows" because it was just too generic and commonly used so they had to trademark "Microsoft Windows" and "MS Windows" And the "win" prefix on many names as well. Becuse of their use of windows and how closely it was associated with them they were able to win a claim against Lindows for dilution and confusion of their brand. So in essence they have enforceable sole use of the word "Windows" in the computer software arena without actually being able to register it as a trademark.

Microsoft applied for the trademark for 'Windows' in 1990. By then, Mac OS had been using the term for 6 years and Amiga for a similar amount of time. So even if you ignore Unix, Smalltalk, and lots of other operating systems that used the term 'windows', the term had clearly been popularized - even before Microsoft came out with MicrosoftWindows.

Typo :

Their applicrashion store.

That is a good point.

Not if you're not only an Apple consumer, but a shareholder too......

scotty321 was incorrect in thinking the term App originated with the iPhone. It is from the early 1980s, and "killer app" descended from that usage.

Well, we are going in circles here, but I'll put one in...
I'm not sure what you mean by a "linguistic concept" but nobody is arguing that Apple owns the term "app" or the term "store." It is in putting the two together for a place to buy programs for mobile devices that (as far as I can tell) nobody has any evidence of being used before Apple started doing it.

If this is indeed a unique usage of those two common terms, then it is trademarkable. The fact that the term seems obvious in hindsight (mostly because Apple's own use of it has been massively popular) does not mean that Apple cannot trademark the combined term.


BTW, I do not know why you think this term is "broad." Does anyone use the term "App store" for anything other than a place to buy mobile programs?

I think it still makes difference.

App Store X, for example, does sound a bit more distinctive than just App Store.

The way I see it, "app store" is more of description than name. What is that? An app store. What is the name of that app store? Er... App Store?

App and Application predate NeXT. They came from Apple Lisa and, subsequently, Macintosh.