

Apple to lose iPhone trademark in Brazil: source - stevewillensky
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/05/us-brazil-apple-copyright-idUSBRE91417G20130205

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hcarvalhoalves
It's ridiculous, they have a campaign to explain _their_ iPhone is not _the_
iPhone. They even highlight how their product is _worse_ than Apple's (saying
things like, "the Apple iPhone is faster, has more resolution"):

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkRf6Gv4NtU>

They probably made the campaign so no one can sue them for false marketing
later, though they will surely sell units to uneducated parents thinking they
got a really good deal on an iPhone for 1/3 of the price.

~~~
StavrosK
How is it ridiculous? They registered first, they say that their iphone is
clearly not an Apple iPhone, they show the differences, so what's ridiculous
about it? Seems pretty clear that it was their trademark first.

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Capricornucopia
This makes me happy.

Did you know at least one other corporation had a trademark for the name
iPhone before Apple announced their choice of product name in 2007?

Considering what patent trolls Apple is, and considering Brazil is a sizable
market for smartphones and computer equipment, this is a tiny bit of karma, as
far as I'm concerned.

BTW, Xerox has yet to see money for inventing the OS GUI and the modern mouse.

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ksherlock
Do you mean the infogear/linksys/cisco iphone? The one that was discontinued
in 2001?

<http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1127>

A mark shall be deemed to be “abandoned” if either of the following occurs:

(1) When its use has been discontinued with intent not to resume such use.
Intent not to resume may be inferred from circumstances. Nonuse for 3
consecutive years shall be prima facie evidence of abandonment. “Use” of a
mark means the bona fide use of such mark made in the ordinary course of
trade, and not made merely to reserve a right in a mark.

~~~
vacri
Strange that a trademark should only last 3 years of non-active use when
copyright is lifetime + 70 years. I guess there's IP and there's IP.

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Raydric
Translation goes around these lines: On the year 2000 (Apple's iPhone only
came in 2007), our marketing department needed a name for our "internet
phone", the name was too big so we decided to use "iphone" instead. We filled
the patent register in the same year and in 2008 the INPI gave us full patent
rights.

Now they proceed to explain how Gradiente's Iphone is a piece of garbage, they
could have added that Apple's iPhone on Brazil costs 2 or 3 times more than on
other countries, but they didn't.

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guidefreitas
I think that this decision can stop Apple from sell iphones here in Brazil. We
pay an huge amount of money for apple products because of government taxes (an
iPhone 5 costs the equivalent of U$1.300) and I don't think Apple sells a lot
of iphones here to compensate buy the trademark. Sometimes it's cheaper to
take a plane and buy it in another country. I understand that Gradiente has
the right to fight for the name, after all they registered it first. But they
don't have an real competidor and are just use the name to fight with Apple
for money (patent troll?). That's wrong and everybody loses.

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fleitz
I wonder if they will sell it to Apple now that it has been established that
the IP belongs to someone else.

I don't think the question is so much whether this is wrong / right, but how
does Apple proceed from here?

What kind of price could be negotiated?

Will Gradiente take it, or is the confusion worth more?

~~~
Steko
My understanding is that Gradiente only released their phone to prop up the ip
claim who's registration was running out. The whole point for them has always
been to get a fat check from Apple and it looks like they will. Apple is no
stranger to writing checks for their tendency to run roughshod over other
people's IP. That's not exactly what happened here but, like with the ipad in
China mark, I imagine they'll end up writing a hefty 8 digit check for the
iphone in Brazil rights.

