Can “Booking.com” be trademarked? Supremes hear oral arguments

2 points

6 years ago

In as far as open source is concerned, the IP issues have mainly been in copyright and patent. While this is not directly open source, it may affect any one who uses domain names as part of their trade mark or if you use a name that is similar to someone else's registered Trademark that has a generic name that ends with .com or .org.

𝗕𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗴𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 The word Booking is considered generic. Because of an old ruling (https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/128/598) names that describe a class of goods cannot be trademarked even if you add Co at the end. The word "booking" can be seen as the class of what Booking.com does. Just appending ".com" should not make it available for a trademark.

𝗥𝗲𝘀𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗰𝗲𝘀 An discussion: https://youtu.be/zMwXHT8JXAE?t=270 The papers shared: https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/united-states-patent-and-trademark-office-v-booking-com-b-v/ The oral arguments: https://www.c-span.org/video/?471417-1/supreme-court-oral-argument-patent-trademark-office-v-bookingcom

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