Estee Lauder sues Excite over keywords
Hey all,
Check out the story by Wired News' Chris Oaks:
Mascara Mogul Sues Excite
http://www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/17591.html
It is about Estee Lauder suing Excite because Excite sold to
another company a keyword on which Estee Lauder owned the
trademark.
I knew such a suit was going to happen sooner or later. Two
years ago we had a pharmaceutical client for which we wanted
to do a keyword banner campaign. We discovered that their
competitor had bought our client's trademarked product names
as keywords. When I told Yahoo (where it was happening) that
these were trademarked names, their response was that if we
paid for the words they would take them away from the
competitor and give them to us. But only if we paid for it.
Otherwise, Yahoo would sell the words to whoever was willing
to pay for them.
I have said on various occasions, both privately and at
conferences where I've spoken, that sooner or later someone
will get sued over this practice. Basically, Yahoo was
telling me that I must pay them to stop infringment on my
client's trademark.
More power to Estee Lauder. I hope they win. Using other
peoples trademarks in this manner is dirty pool at best.
richard
--------------------------------------------------------
richard hoy
moderator, online advertising discussion list
vice president, marketing and client promotions
the tenagra corporation
http://www.tenagra.com/
p: 281.480.6300 | f: 281.480.7715 | e: rhoy_at_tenagra.com
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Received on Fri Jan 29 1999 - 08:02:56 CST
