Mashable - The Social Media Guide - Latest Comments in Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Kyocera Cartridges — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 19:54:50 -0000

At least they manage to choose the right decision. Not bad at all!

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

tanacea — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 21:54:03 -0000

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Lauren Sheet — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 09:18:35 -0000

Different goods & services; different words used in conjuction with "internet" within the mark, etc. Not uncommon to have multiple marks with the same wording on different products as long as the consumer would not assume they were from the same source.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Michael — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 08:57:35 -0000

So how much does a trademark in Internet mean if it has been trademarked that many times. How can that be defensible even within the same industry?

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Lauren Sheet — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 08:12:03 -0000

Michael, there are currently 4735 "internet", 4146 "enterprise", 9324 "love", and 7705 "me" live trademarks on file witht he US Patent & Trademark Office.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Michael — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 20:44:20 -0000

I was at an entrepreneurs round table last night discussing Google not wanting "google" to be a verb. Funny thing is all the marketing effort they spent trying to get people to do just that.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Gaby — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 18:45:02 -0000

Google don't like "google" being used as a verb though. Which is kind of odd really, because I know from a chat room I moderate that many people use "googling" to mean "do a search" and then they end up using Google anyway. Ie they want to look something up and someone instantly says "google it" rather than "yeah, let's look that up somewhere"

I do hope Twitter don't start going after businesses for using "tweet" because there are a lot out there using it. Still, it Twitter get "tweet" trademarked they will be able to use it to take down annoying twitter apps.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Michael — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 17:06:41 -0000

I'm pretty sure that Tweet, Tweeps, Twitterati and most of the rest of Twitter's Twittacular vernacular came from users. So, from a legal standpoint (I'm not a lawyer) and a perception standpoint, it'd be bad form for them to trademark phrases created by Twitter's loyal users.
As far as trademarking the word Twitter, I here by trademark the words "Internet", "Enterprise", "Love", and "Me".

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Lauren Sheet — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 12:59:14 -0000

Blog is ill informed. A likelihood of confusion office action can easily be overcome (not to mention the mark was filed in a different class of goods. services than conflicting marks – and we could have another whole conversation on dilution of famous maeks). It is a non-final action and the company has until January 1, 2010 to respond to it. Nothing to see here, move along.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

danielle — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 11:16:06 -0000

so, uh, what are birds who talk to each other doing now? I hate to think that word is forever associated with banal non-thoughts instead of lovely chirping.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

lancer — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 11:15:52 -0000

some people can't live without updating their tweet.. tweet is a mark of get together again or a simple friendly approach ..

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

lancer — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 11:12:57 -0000

some people can't live without updating their tweet.. tweet is a mark of get together again or a simple friendly approach ..

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

craig — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 10:01:39 -0000

Then www.tweexchange.com will live on forever without any name worries!

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

jb — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 09:42:06 -0000

Just to clarify, the PTO records merely indicate "A non-final action has been mailed. This is a letter from the examining attorney requesting additional information and/or making an initial refusal. However, no final determination as to the registrability of the mark has been made" It's not unusual for a trademark application to initially get refused, although they still may face problems. So they still may get a registered trademark.

Also, tweet was previously known word (as was Apple and many other powerful trademarks). In fact, there are several registered trademarks for "tweet", but for different products/services. Twitter also filed for "retweet". You can take a known word and brand it for a particular product or service. You are not removing that word from public use. Instead, you are excluding others from using that mark on confusing similar products/services (e.g., Apple can exclude other electronics manufacturers from using "Apple", but not the farmer or pie maker or shampoo manufacturer, etc.).

Also, Google has several registered trademarks.

Finally, a trademark owner can try to revive a trademark that has gone "generic". I think "Jeep" spent a lot of money the past decade trying to rebrand and recapture Jeep as a trademark.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Hostwisely — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 09:38:48 -0000

There are many languages had been adopted by the people, I think that it really depends on how they choose this,but how could this happen if they already have twitter as a trademark??

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

samj — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:57:37 -0000

Yes, just recently (in May), but that doesn't make it enforceable. More on that point soon...

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

iHouse — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:54:48 -0000

But "Twitter" is already registered by Twitter, right?

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Paul_Cometos — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:21:38 -0000

I want to trademark a word "GO". Where must I apply?

John Trademarker

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

samj — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 07:38:44 -0000

"retweet" is not trademarked but it would be covered by a successful trademark of "tweet" anyway.

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

samj — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 07:38:00 -0000

So far as I can tell Twitter were NOT the ones who "really promoted this word" - the grassroots community and media did and until very recently Twitter used the term "updates" and distanced themselves from the term "tweet". The real question now is not whether they get to have "tweet" (it was never theirs to trademark) but whether they get to keep "Twitter".

Sam

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

samj — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 07:35:26 -0000

Doug,

Indeed it is unfair that Twitter have allowed rampant abuse of their trademark and are now taking action when it's too late for others to change. Fortunately for you your book isn't dependent on Twitter accounts or APIs - otherwise they could just turn you off like they did for @retweet (though not necessary in compliance with their own terms of service).

IANAL but you may be well advised to stand your ground in this instance, and in any case your book is in a different class and simply references Twitter - imagine if it were not possible to write books about Ferraris for example, or Microsoft software?

Sam

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Batman — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 06:38:23 -0000

Well, that was 37 years ago, so, I'll bow to your superior knowledge.... You may be right, but at this point, it doesn't matter....

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Sean Boone — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 06:20:51 -0000

What's your opinion then for the term "retweet" being trademarked?

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

Liz — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 05:51:24 -0000

Good! Soon, Twitter will go the way of Xerox & Kleenex, just become a generic way to describe some forms of communication. I can see where they'd like to trademark their company name but they shouldn't be able to control the use of common words. Just imagine if AT&T owned the rights to "telephone" or "phone"!

Re: Twitter is a Twademark. Tweet: Not Yet, Maybe Never

firetown — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 05:48:14 -0000

very smart decision IMO. Looking at how much power the USPTO has awarded the national association of realtors at one point.