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Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

businessweek.com

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Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#31

Post by flyosity »

extension wrote: post #14

So, if you have a store that sells apps , what does Apple expect you to call it? Software Shop? Algorithm Emporium? If "app store" can be trademarked, surely there must be an alternative that sounds equally or more generic.

The phrase App Store was not in use before Apple's App Store was created. Take a look at Google Trends from the past few years. Nobody talked about it until Apple used the term, now, it's used like people saying Kleenex when they could have just said tissue.

Apple wasn't the first to have a centralized location where users could download software. If they called it the Apple Software Center I bet everyone would be calling their software centers Software Centers and we'd be having the same argument.

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#32

Post by edanm »

extension wrote: post #24
vog wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's not so much the term app store but the term app that Apple kind of "registered". Of course, app is just an abbreviation for application , but this term is currently used almost exclusively for applications on Apple platforms.

I dunno, "web app" has been common lingo for over a decade. You just don't hear it much anymore because it's lost its buzzword status. Interestingly, the first Google hit for "web app" is some sort of Apple store. A preemptive strike?

Actually, I doubt most people know what a "web app" is. Have you ever tried to explain the difference between a Web Site and a Web App to someone non-technical?

Apps, on the other hand, are definitely understood to be mobile applications. Can't say whether it's tied specifically to Apple or not though.

That's not to say I agree with App Store being trademarked - it's pretty ridiculous, IMO.

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#33

Post by watty »

flyosity wrote: post #31
extension wrote: post #14

So, if you have a store that sells apps , what does Apple expect you to call it? Software Shop? Algorithm Emporium? If "app store" can be trademarked, surely there must be an alternative that sounds equally or more generic.

The phrase App Store was not in use before Apple's App Store was created. Take a look at Google Trends from the past few years. Nobody talked about it until Apple used the term, now, it's used like people saying Kleenex when they could have just said tissue. Apple wasn't the first to have a centralized location where users could download software. If they called it the Apple Software Center I bet everyone would be ca…

I think if the word "app" is proven to be generic with prior use, "app store" shouldn't be able to be trademarked. "Kleenex" is a unique word with no meaning prior to Kleenex, not so of an "app store", completely different case.

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#34

Post by extension »

flyosity wrote: post #31
extension wrote: post #14

So, if you have a store that sells apps , what does Apple expect you to call it? Software Shop? Algorithm Emporium? If "app store" can be trademarked, surely there must be an alternative that sounds equally or more generic.

The phrase App Store was not in use before Apple's App Store was created. Take a look at Google Trends from the past few years. Nobody talked about it until Apple used the term, now, it's used like people saying Kleenex when they could have just said tissue. Apple wasn't the first to have a centralized location where users could download software. If they called it the Apple Software Center I bet everyone would be ca…

Popularizing a term does not automatically mean you can trademark it. Purely descriptive language like "app store" generally cannot be trademarked unless it has "acquired distinctiveness" through use in trade.

Apple has to show that people think "app store" means Apple's app store. How many people have to think that, and how technically inclined those people have to be, I don't know. The reaction to this story shows at least that the tech community does not think that. I don't know how trademark law deals with large rifts in public perception.

Further reading: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark_distinctiveness

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#35

Post by Symmetry »

watty wrote: post #33
flyosity wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The phrase App Store was not in use before Apple's App Store was created. Take a look at Google Trends from the past few years. Nobody talked about it until Apple used the term, now, it's used like people saying Kleenex when they could have just said tissue. Apple wasn't the first to have a centralized location where users could download software. If they called it the Apple Software Center I bet everyone would be ca…

I think if the word "app" is proven to be generic with prior use, "app store" shouldn't be able to be trademarked. "Kleenex" is a unique word with no meaning prior to Kleenex, not so of an "app store", completely different case.

Whats worse for Apple, "Kleenex" was so dominant at one point that it came close to being Genericized [1]. If the public doesn't think of a word as referring to a specific product but instead they think of "Kleenex" as a name for all soft facial tissues then in the US at least the "Kleenex" trade mark can lose its legal force.

It might be that Apple invented the term "App Store", but as long as members of the public would tend to refer to application repositories from Google or Amazon by the same term, even without Google or Amazon using it, then "App Store" isn't serving a useful purpose as a trademark and doesn't have the same legal force as a word that was in practice only specific to Apple.

I, personally, love the fact that the law around trademarks corresponds so well to their purpose - preventing consumers from being confused. This is one of the reasons I don't like the term "intellectual property", it takes three things that are very different legally and lumps them together in a way that sometimes causes people to think that the rules governing one apply to others, or that the attitudes they have towards one form should apply to all of them. Personally I'm pretty ambivalent about whether we ought to have patents and copyrights at all - but I think that trademarks are awesome and we'd be much worse off without them.

EDIT: Oops, forgot to put in the reference: [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genericized_trademark

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#36

Post by Symmetry »

sigzero wrote: post #23
extension wrote: post #14

So, if you have a store that sells apps , what does Apple expect you to call it? Software Shop? Algorithm Emporium? If "app store" can be trademarked, surely there must be an alternative that sounds equally or more generic.

Please..."Windows" was trademarked and that is a much more generic term than "App Store". Reality plays no part in this.

You're confused here. Trademarks dont' apply globally like patents or copyrights, they only apply within contexts where there is likely to be consumer confusion.

Microsoft can have "Windows" brand operating systems. I could create a chain of "Windows" restaurants. A company that sells windows absolutely could not create a "Windows" trademark and expect it to have any legal force.

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#38

Post by Symmetry »

Locke1689 wrote: post #12
Blarat wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I really don't understand is how Apple can do this due to the face that Amazon won't (and can't) sell any "Apple app store apps" on their store, so they won't be a competitor. For me it's if a company that produces patches to repair bicycle tubes called their product for "band aid", same idea but different markets.

That's not really a fair analogy because, while the Amazon marketplace may not sell iOS Apps, presumably they sell things which compete in the same market (i.e., solve the same problem). The Band-Aid competitors don't literally sell Band-Aids, but they do sell self-adhesive bandages that compete directly with the market for Band-Aids.

Are they actually competitors? Band-Aid sells bandages for people and other people have band-aids for bicycle tires. Apple has an App Store for iOS devices, while Google and Amazon have app stores for Android devices... I'm not saying its obviously one way or the others, but it doesn't seem clear cut to me.

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#39

Post by benologist »

extension wrote: post #14

So, if you have a store that sells apps , what does Apple expect you to call it? Software Shop? Algorithm Emporium? If "app store" can be trademarked, surely there must be an alternative that sounds equally or more generic.

Application store!

Re: Apple Denies Amazon’s Claim That ‘App Store’ Is Generic Term

#40

Post by nailer »

nailer wrote: post #26
extension wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It wasn't trademarked by a company that sells windows.

It was trademarked by a company that sells lls a windowing owing system.

Pardon the obvious software error, but could people please not downmod a well known fact? Microsift sells a windowing system.
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