On: Patent Office Agrees To Facebook’s “Face” Trademark

[xatax]

Wait... maybe I've been grossly misinformed, but I thought you couldn't trademark, for lack of a better term, a single normal word.

Isn't this why Google is called "Google" and not "Googol"?

[rbanffy → xatax]

Just try to market an integrated office suite called "Office", an OS called "Windows" or a computer called "Apple" to see what happens...

[xatax → rbanffy]

Just try to market an integrated office suite called "Office"

Microsoft owns the trademark to something like "Microsoft Office" not the actual word Office, right?

Also, doesn't OpenOffice still exist?

[citricsquid → xatax]

They own it when used in defined context:

> Telecommunication services, namely, providing online chat rooms and electronic bulletin boards for transmission of messages among computer users in the field of general interest and concerning social and entertainment subject matter, none primarily featuring or relating to motoring or to cars.

So if you use "Face" ... in any of those areas you're infringing on their trademark, however if you named your cleaning product "facebegone" you'd be fine.

[xatax → citricsquid]

I didn't realize you could do that. I guess I learned something new today.

[Myrth → citricsquid]

> facebegone

The best tools for The Cleaner.

[rbanffy → xatax]

> Microsoft owns the trademark to something like "Microsoft Office" not the actual word Office, right?

I think the fact there is no Sun (or Oracle, or IBM) Office speaks for itself. Specially in the case of McNeally's Sun, that would find it specially appealing to dilute the value of a Microsoft brand by naming a product as close to theirs as possible. No one did it.

People fear, understandably, Microsoft's lawyers.

[jawee → rbanffy]

There are plenty, for example...

Commercial: OpenOffice.org and StarOffice (Sun/Oracle), Kingsoft Office, SoftMaker Office Plus FOSS/Freeware ones like: LibreOffice, KOffice, Siag Office,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_suite