Google's feeling tough enough to fight its wars on two fronts when it comes to trademark law. As I mentioned below, our May issue includes a story about the Rescuecom v. Google lawsuit at the 2nd Circuit, where Google is looking for a big win; today, Slashdot points to this TV news story about how Google intends to allow U.K. advertisers to buy ads on trademarked keywords, as they already do in the U.S. Of course, some mark-holders already are threatening to sue, as several have in the U.S. (they've all either lost, or lost badly.) No word in this story on when Google will implement this new policy, or such changes are in the works anywhere else.
Currently, if a British searcher types in "Ford cars," she'll see an organic link to Ford and possibly a paid ad for Ford, but won't see an ad for, say, Honda, while an American making the same search may see such competitors advertising. (Yahoo doesn't sell trademarked keywords in the U.S., but they'd like to—they weighed in with an amicus brief supporting Google in the Rescuecom case, together with eBay.)
Last month, I talked to Keker & Van Nest lawyer Michael Page, who is representing Google against Rescuecom in New York, and we talked about the differences between American & European trademark laws.
"European trademark laws are very different beasts," says Page. "They really think of it as owning the words, and you can’t use them. American laws are about protecting consumers." Some of the European trademark decisions have been "very harsh," he notes. "Germany and France are very both anti-speech; it's a sort of thought control. eBay has lost a series of decisions... They can’t allow anyone to list for sale World War II or Nazi memorabilia anywhere. It’s a fairly hostile environment for commerce and speech."
So, for example, it might be tougher for Georgia computer store owner Charles Smith to sell T-shirts and beer steins with slogans like Wal-Qaeda and Wal-ocaust outside a Wal-Mart in, say, Paris. (Is there such a thing?) But Smith resides in Georgia, where he is free to thumb his nose at the world's largest retailer and create bizarre and disturbing images like the ones pictured here. After Wal-Mart told him to cease and desist, Stanford Professor Larry Lessig hooked Smith up with lawyers from Public Citizen and the ACLU, who helped Smith win a complete victory in March after a two-year battle against the mega-store. In an 82-page smackdown, a federal judge basically told Wal-Mart that 1) Smith is a parodist, 2) it's a free country, and 3) deal.
Wal-Mart apparently paid $200,000 just to conduct a survey to measure alleged "consumer confusion," and probably paid millions to their Quinn Emanuel lawyers. And for what? Here's the best part: Smith sold all of 62 T-shirts, including 15 to one of Wal-Mart's outside law firms! Not exactly a weapon of mass dilution. (which law firm bought the shirts?? Inquiring minds want to know! Please email pics of any lawyers seen wearing Wal-Qaeda T-shirts.) Wal-Mart lost more than just money in this litigation: the judge ruled that the store has no common-law trademark claim to its yellow smiley face; that's not good timing, since the company's trademark on that symbol is being challenged at the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.
Speaking personally, I think the term "Walocaust" is a heavy-handed and unfortunate metaphor that's likely to offend folks with connections to the real Holocaust. Using a Holocaust reference to discuss anything that's not actual genocide just isn't helpful to anyone, including would-be parodists and critics.
But Wal-Mart's attempt to label Smith as a lawbreaker for "diluting" and tarnishing their trademark is a good example of how trademark laws, like copyrights and patents, today reach far beyond their historical roots. Unlike copyrights and patents, which are monopolies granted as incentives to creators, trademarks are granted so that consumers clearly understand the true source of a good or service they're buying. We're all better off with only Wal-Mart being allowed to slap up a sign on its stores that says "Wal-Mart," because we know who we're buying from; but the thinking is, we're also better off knowing that if push comes to shove, we can always start selling Wal-Qaeda T-shirts.
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