The question is wether the claimed term is purely descriptive for what is offered, and is only logical for everyone to be used as such, whoever offers it.
When the term was filed, the word App was closely tied to the iPhone. Then, it made sense that Apple owned the term.
But now, the word 'app' has become generic, and as Microsoft demonstrates, Apple *lets that happen*.
I'm convinced that Apple has *chosen* this route.
Sometimes you protect your brand legally, sometimes you have to rely on your market power.
What I'm trying to sau is that Microsoft will probably win the case, but that will not help them.
In the market as it is today, if they call their own store the Microsoft App Store, this will only cost them authority and further establish Apple's dominant position.
The term App Store is already related immediately to Apple by the consumer, Microsoft should focus in making great products and stop fighting over this.
As far as I understand it "App Store" is descriptive of what the thing is, which is the problem. You can't register a car as "car" or a bike as "bike".
Apple could put forward a decent argument that they actually created the "App Store" though, and I don't know how it works in that case.
If I invented the first teleporter could I trademark "teleporter"? I don't know!
As far as I understand it "App Store" is descriptive of what the thing is, which is the problem. You can't register a car as "car" or a bike as "bike".
Apple could put forward a decent argument that they actually created the "App Store" though, and I don't know how it works in that case.
If I invented the first teleporter could I trademark "teleporter"? I don't know!
No but you can register a Ka.
Prior to Apple launching the App store, the term App was not used much, prior to 2000 the term iPod was not used much.
i might be wrong, but i don't seem to recall "app" being an everyday word until the app store was born. has it entered the dictionary yet? surely it's overdue if not
I don't know about anyone else, but the timing of this seems to be a little late to me. The store was opened in 2008, it's now 2011 .. ? Why in the world would anyone wait that long to file an objection? Surely, they aren't really that slow, are they??
After years of losing smartphone market share to Apple's popular iPhone, Microsoft released a new mobile operating system, Windows Phone 7, along with Marketplace, its answer to Apple's App Store, last fall. At the end of December, it was revealed that the Windows Phone 7 platform had reached the 5,000 app milestone, well behind the more than 300,000 apps available for Apple's iOS.
Last fall, several Windows Phone 7 developers expressed concern over development for the platform, complaining that Microsoft had yet to release any app store analytics and was delaying payment until February 2011. Microsoft quickly changed course, releasing reporting tools for its developers and moving up the first pay date to January 2011.
Some pundits had speculated that Microsoft's delay in releasing Marketplace analytics was to delay the public revelation of Windows Phone 7 sales numbers. Initial reviews of WP7 were muted; reviewers praised the interface, while criticizing it as several years behind Apple's iOS and Google's Android mobile OS.
The U.S. launch of Windows Phone 7 was lackluster, with some stores reporting having sold just a handful of units.
In December, technology journalist Walt Mossberg pressed Microsoft VP Joe Belfiore for specific sales figures, but Belfiore repeatedly dodged the question. Belfiore later admitted to Mossberg that it could take at least "a couple of years" for Microsoft to "get back into the market."
*snip*
Half of this article is completely irrelevant to the subject at hand and rehashes information that's been posted at AI many times already. Is this DED again?
Prior to the iPhone and the app store and Steve J going in public talking about it I never really heard people talking about "apps" as a generic word. Since apple made the word App so popular that it probably made its way into in the dictionaries others also wanna use the term "app-store".
But if they just brainstorm a little I'm sure they'd come up with something appropriate.
Good article again from AppleInsider. The first with the news, and with insightful, intelligent thought provoking, commentary.
Well written - long may it last.
And yes, "App Store" is a perfectly good Trademark. Microsoft has its back against the wall. For example, would it it have raised this issue ten years ago?
Prior to the iPhone and the app store and Steve J going in public talking about it I never really heard people talking about "apps" as a generic word. Since apple made the word App so popular that it probably made its way into in the dictionaries others also wanna use the term "app-store".
But if they just brainstorm a little I'm sure they'd come up with something appropriate.
AppMarket
AppMe
AppStand
AppSale
FillMeApp
AppStation
There you go Micro.
Free to use 1 minute brainstorm session.
Just let's go with "AppStore" and not "App Store" or "app store".
Is it how MS planning to make money in the future?
What a stupid article. You could pull a better written story from a grade school.
The first half was ok. The second half (excluding the last paragraph) just bitched about WP7 and didn't even make sense.
How about some references to previous cases (from Apple, Microsoft and others) of trademarks being rejected/accepted after being challenged as "too generic"? Put this story in context. Make it so that I actually learn something from reading it.
As it stands I now have to track down the article on another site to get the real story.
Ridiculous.
Real journalists would have given background regarding the purpose of a trademark, how they are different from copyrights, and the prohibitions against generic or merely descriptive marks.
But this is AI, and they are ignorant of the basics. The second half of the story was filler. It was intended to inflame the ignorant into making lots of comments. Remember, the more comments, the more money AI gets from Google.
Remember: Every time you post a comment, Google makes money.
Internet is a generic term referring to the connections around the world of computers.
Explorer is a generic term for someone who goes around seeking out things.
Here's some background in the subject, via Wikipedia.
The spectrum of distinctiveness
Courts often speak of marks falling along the following "spectrum of distinctiveness":
Fanciful marks
A fanciful / inherently distinctive trademark is prima facie registrable, and comprises an entirely invented or "fanciful" sign. For example, "Kodak" had no meaning before it was adopted and used as a trademark in relation to goods, whether photographic goods or otherwise. Invented marks are neologisms which will not previously have been found in any dictionary.
Arbitrary marks
An arbitrary trademark is usually a common word which is used in a meaningless context (e.g. "Apple" for computers). Such marks consist of words or images which have some dictionary meaning before being adopted as trademarks, but which are used in connection with products or services unrelated to that dictionary meaning. Arbitrary marks are also immediately eligible for registration. Salty would be an arbitrary mark if it used in connection with e.g. telephones such as in Salty Telephones, as the term "salt" has no particular connection with such products.
Suggestive marks
A suggestive trademark tends to indicate the nature, quality, or a characteristic of the products or services in relation to which it is used, but does not describe this characteristic, and requires imagination on the part of the consumer to identify the characteristic. Suggestive marks invoke the consumer?s perceptive imagination. An example of a suggestive mark is Blu-ray, a new technology of high-capacity data storage.
Descriptive marks
A descriptive mark is a term with a dictionary meaning which is used in connection with products or services directly related to that meaning. An example might be Salty used in connection with saltine crackers or anchovies. Such terms are not registrable unless it can be shown that distinctive character has been established in the term through extensive use in the marketplace (see further below). Lektronic was famously refused protection by the USPTO on ground of being descriptive for electronic goods.
Generic marks
A generic term is the common name for the products or services in connection with which it is used, such as "salt" when used in connection with sodium chloride. A generic term is not capable of serving the essential trademark function of distinguishing the products or services of a business from the products or services of other businesses, and therefore cannot be afforded any legal protection. This is because there has to be some term which may generally be used by anyone?including other manufacturers?to refer to a product without using some organization's proprietary trademark. Marks which become generic after losing distinctive character are known as genericized trademarks.
i might be wrong, but i don't seem to recall "app" being an everyday word until the app store was born. has it entered the dictionary yet? surely it's overdue if not
Much like patents, trademark registrations have gotten out of hand.
It should not be possible to trademark an already used word, ever. You want a trademark, you should have to make up a new word.
Apple may be the cause of the word application being shortened to app, but they're not the ones who came up with the word, and even if they were, it was in common use for years before they decided they wanted a trademark.
It's generic, M$ is right this time. Not that they usually are on this issue - they should be forced to give up trademarks on windows and word.
Oh, and trademark loss on genericization should be automatic. Words like xerox, kleenex, and google are now part of the language, and should no longer be trademarkable, much like aspirin is now fully public domain, rather than a trademark of Bayer. As far as that goes, apple shouldn't be trademarkable by itself, they should have kept the company name Apple Computer.
Comments
When the term was filed, the word App was closely tied to the iPhone. Then, it made sense that Apple owned the term.
But now, the word 'app' has become generic, and as Microsoft demonstrates, Apple *lets that happen*.
I'm convinced that Apple has *chosen* this route.
Sometimes you protect your brand legally, sometimes you have to rely on your market power.
What I'm trying to sau is that Microsoft will probably win the case, but that will not help them.
In the market as it is today, if they call their own store the Microsoft App Store, this will only cost them authority and further establish Apple's dominant position.
The term App Store is already related immediately to Apple by the consumer, Microsoft should focus in making great products and stop fighting over this.
As far as I understand it "App Store" is descriptive of what the thing is, which is the problem. You can't register a car as "car" or a bike as "bike".
Apple could put forward a decent argument that they actually created the "App Store" though, and I don't know how it works in that case.
If I invented the first teleporter could I trademark "teleporter"? I don't know!
If I invented the first teleporter could I trademark "teleporter"? I don't know!
Why not?
As far as I understand it "App Store" is descriptive of what the thing is, which is the problem. You can't register a car as "car" or a bike as "bike".
Apple could put forward a decent argument that they actually created the "App Store" though, and I don't know how it works in that case.
If I invented the first teleporter could I trademark "teleporter"? I don't know!
No but you can register a Ka.
Prior to Apple launching the App store, the term App was not used much, prior to 2000 the term iPod was not used much.
App is also an abbreviation of Apple.
*snip*
After years of losing smartphone market share to Apple's popular iPhone, Microsoft released a new mobile operating system, Windows Phone 7, along with Marketplace, its answer to Apple's App Store, last fall. At the end of December, it was revealed that the Windows Phone 7 platform had reached the 5,000 app milestone, well behind the more than 300,000 apps available for Apple's iOS.
Last fall, several Windows Phone 7 developers expressed concern over development for the platform, complaining that Microsoft had yet to release any app store analytics and was delaying payment until February 2011. Microsoft quickly changed course, releasing reporting tools for its developers and moving up the first pay date to January 2011.
Some pundits had speculated that Microsoft's delay in releasing Marketplace analytics was to delay the public revelation of Windows Phone 7 sales numbers. Initial reviews of WP7 were muted; reviewers praised the interface, while criticizing it as several years behind Apple's iOS and Google's Android mobile OS.
The U.S. launch of Windows Phone 7 was lackluster, with some stores reporting having sold just a handful of units.
In December, technology journalist Walt Mossberg pressed Microsoft VP Joe Belfiore for specific sales figures, but Belfiore repeatedly dodged the question. Belfiore later admitted to Mossberg that it could take at least "a couple of years" for Microsoft to "get back into the market."
*snip*
Half of this article is completely irrelevant to the subject at hand and rehashes information that's been posted at AI many times already. Is this DED again?
But if they just brainstorm a little I'm sure they'd come up with something appropriate.
AppMarket
AppMe
AppStand
AppSale
FillMeApp
AppStation
There you go Micro.
Free to use 1 minute brainstorm session.
Well written - long may it last.
And yes, "App Store" is a perfectly good Trademark. Microsoft has its back against the wall. For example, would it it have raised this issue ten years ago?
Prior to the iPhone and the app store and Steve J going in public talking about it I never really heard people talking about "apps" as a generic word. Since apple made the word App so popular that it probably made its way into in the dictionaries others also wanna use the term "app-store".
But if they just brainstorm a little I'm sure they'd come up with something appropriate.
AppMarket
AppMe
AppStand
AppSale
FillMeApp
AppStation
There you go Micro.
Free to use 1 minute brainstorm session.
Just let's go with "AppStore" and not "App Store" or "app store".
Is it how MS planning to make money in the future?
What a stupid article. You could pull a better written story from a grade school.
The first half was ok. The second half (excluding the last paragraph) just bitched about WP7 and didn't even make sense.
How about some references to previous cases (from Apple, Microsoft and others) of trademarks being rejected/accepted after being challenged as "too generic"? Put this story in context. Make it so that I actually learn something from reading it.
As it stands I now have to track down the article on another site to get the real story.
Ridiculous.
Real journalists would have given background regarding the purpose of a trademark, how they are different from copyrights, and the prohibitions against generic or merely descriptive marks.
But this is AI, and they are ignorant of the basics. The second half of the story was filler. It was intended to inflame the ignorant into making lots of comments. Remember, the more comments, the more money AI gets from Google.
Remember: Every time you post a comment, Google makes money.
Internet Explorer.
Internet is a generic term referring to the connections around the world of computers.
Explorer is a generic term for someone who goes around seeking out things.
Here's some background in the subject, via Wikipedia.
The spectrum of distinctiveness
Courts often speak of marks falling along the following "spectrum of distinctiveness":
Fanciful marks
A fanciful / inherently distinctive trademark is prima facie registrable, and comprises an entirely invented or "fanciful" sign. For example, "Kodak" had no meaning before it was adopted and used as a trademark in relation to goods, whether photographic goods or otherwise. Invented marks are neologisms which will not previously have been found in any dictionary.
Arbitrary marks
An arbitrary trademark is usually a common word which is used in a meaningless context (e.g. "Apple" for computers). Such marks consist of words or images which have some dictionary meaning before being adopted as trademarks, but which are used in connection with products or services unrelated to that dictionary meaning. Arbitrary marks are also immediately eligible for registration. Salty would be an arbitrary mark if it used in connection with e.g. telephones such as in Salty Telephones, as the term "salt" has no particular connection with such products.
Suggestive marks
A suggestive trademark tends to indicate the nature, quality, or a characteristic of the products or services in relation to which it is used, but does not describe this characteristic, and requires imagination on the part of the consumer to identify the characteristic. Suggestive marks invoke the consumer?s perceptive imagination. An example of a suggestive mark is Blu-ray, a new technology of high-capacity data storage.
Descriptive marks
A descriptive mark is a term with a dictionary meaning which is used in connection with products or services directly related to that meaning. An example might be Salty used in connection with saltine crackers or anchovies. Such terms are not registrable unless it can be shown that distinctive character has been established in the term through extensive use in the marketplace (see further below). Lektronic was famously refused protection by the USPTO on ground of being descriptive for electronic goods.
Generic marks
A generic term is the common name for the products or services in connection with which it is used, such as "salt" when used in connection with sodium chloride. A generic term is not capable of serving the essential trademark function of distinguishing the products or services of a business from the products or services of other businesses, and therefore cannot be afforded any legal protection. This is because there has to be some term which may generally be used by anyone?including other manufacturers?to refer to a product without using some organization's proprietary trademark. Marks which become generic after losing distinctive character are known as genericized trademarks.
Microsoft free to use Crap Store to sell windows applications.
But in general, the Windows versions of apps are more full-featured and have fewer bugs compared to the OSX version, if any such version is available.
And the software written by Microsoft itself (for regular computers, anyways) is always first-rate.
i might be wrong, but i don't seem to recall "app" being an everyday word until the app store was born. has it entered the dictionary yet? surely it's overdue if not
From the Oxford Dictionaries Online:
"app
Pronunciation: /ap/
noun
Computing
short for application (sense 5)"
http://oxforddictionaries.com/view/e...m_en_gb0034790
The term "app store" was not found.
It should not be possible to trademark an already used word, ever. You want a trademark, you should have to make up a new word.
Apple may be the cause of the word application being shortened to app, but they're not the ones who came up with the word, and even if they were, it was in common use for years before they decided they wanted a trademark.
It's generic, M$ is right this time. Not that they usually are on this issue - they should be forced to give up trademarks on windows and word.
Oh, and trademark loss on genericization should be automatic. Words like xerox, kleenex, and google are now part of the language, and should no longer be trademarkable, much like aspirin is now fully public domain, rather than a trademark of Bayer. As far as that goes, apple shouldn't be trademarkable by itself, they should have kept the company name Apple Computer.