Addi,
when I read this I really had to laugh. Do they really think this is going to work. M$ the victim of this "bully" Sun?
Here is another interesting article from Pointcast:
NEW YORK (CNNfn) - When Microsoft launched its web browser Internet Explorer in 1995, it didn't let anything stand in its way.
Including one small detail -- another company in Illinois already had applied for the name. But Synet was still waiting for word on its federal application.
Microsoft barreled ahead anyway.
"Microsoft has been arrogant all along in their dealings with us," said Dhiren Rana, chief executive of Synet. "They have thought of us as a tiny company, and they have approached us as, 'Well, they're little guys. There's nothing they're going to be able to do.'"
Microsoft says 'Internet Explorer' is a generic term, and Synet had no right to it.
"It's certainly true that a company like Microsoft has the resources to drag out a litigation, to be very aggressive and to do this more often than anybody who is smaller," said Janet Dore, trademark lawyer with Morgan & Finnegan.
Synet has been fighting the case for the last two years. Overpowered by Microsoft's legal and financial muscle, Synet is now in Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and twenty of its employees are out of work.
Microsoft offered Synet $75,000 to quit fighting. But the smaller firm's CEO says he doesn't want the money, he wants his 'Internet Explorer' name back.
Ironically, although Microsoft claims the phrase 'Internet Explorer' is generic, it doesn't feel the same way about 'Windows.'
Through hundreds of millions of dollars of advertising and promotion, the software giant has done everything but trademark 'Windows' as its own.
Holger |
