Re: Claws-mail Address Book Bug?
On Sun 13 Mar 2022 at 16:02:25 (+0000), Brad Rogers wrote:
> On Sun, 13 Mar 2022 11:51:03 -0400
> Cindy Sue Causey <butterflybytes@gmail.com> wrote:
> > I remember very early on where there was at least one headline that
> > said Google was considering court action over the use of its name as a
> > verb (copyright, trademark, etc):
> >
> Against who? I mean, since the term was used by everyone (for certain
> values of everyone), short of suing the *entire* population, what did
> they expect to achieve?
> >
> > https://blogs.illinois.edu/view/25/589
As the article says, publishers of Websters, sorry, dictionaries.
Or rather, any publisher that bandies them about, without making
it clear that they're registered/proprietary.
> > That never made sense because being repetitively used as a common verb
> > meant they had arrived, were mainstream at least with tech folks, and
> > received free publicity every time it occurred.
It works both ways. Unless companies spend time and money defending
their trademarks, then they become generic through usage, by default.
Each company has to decide on which works better, threatening lawsuits,
or other ways of advertising their brand.
> Hoover never sued anyone for use of their name as a substitute for the
> term vacuuming.
Exactly, which may be why conventional wisdom says they could never
win a case against the word hoovering, in a British court anyway.
> Nor did AVO sue for use of their name as a substitute for multimeter.
Not quite in the same league.
> Companies these days seem to be run by idiots. Clever idiots, yes. But
> idiots, just the same. :-)
That lets a lot of CEOs off the hook: just plead stupidity for the
harm that some of them do.
Cheers,
David.
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