Do you think Intel would get upset over the slogan "Bloated ASPs Inside" or better yet "More Expensive and Slower than AMD Chip Inside"?
Winsock, the author of the report claims he has read all the criticism and he was right all along. What a surprise! It is all silly, you either blindly follow chip speed ratings in evaluating the comparative quality of Athlons verse P4's or you don't. Obviously, Intel wants the world to believe chip is the exclusive measure of quality and Aberdeen fell for it (or was bought off). Why would anyone by a more expensive computer that in fact executes programs slower than a lower priced PC? Chip speed is not a reliable indicator of PC efficiency and quality. That is the whole point of the AMD XP rating, and why it has been successful.
Tell me what you think of Intel after reading the article from the SF Chronicle below. Lovely corporation.
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Intel forces yoga group to fight for its name
David Lazarus
Friday, March 29, 2002
©2002 San Francisco Chronicle
URL: sfgate.com
Mark Stephens is trying to stay calm. He's taking deep breaths. He's meditating. But it isn't easy keeping cool when you've angered the biggest semiconductor company in the world.
Stephens, founder of the Yoga Inside Foundation in Venice (Los Angeles County), has been duking it out with Santa Clara's Intel Corp. for more than a year over whether his do-gooding nonprofit violates the chipmaker's "Intel Inside" trademark.
The two sides are still nowhere close to resolving the dispute.
"In yoga, there are a number of qualities that we cultivate," Stephens told me. "One is being grounded and rooted. Intel is certainly that. But another is being flexible, like a tree swaying in the wind."
Intel isn't like a tree swaying in the wind?
"I haven't seen much flexibility so far," Stephens replied.
Yoga Inside has nothing to do with computers. It provides free yoga classes in schools, treatment facilities, shelters, prisons and underprivileged communities.
The nationwide program is represented in the Bay Area at more than a dozen schools and correctional facilities from Petaluma to San Jose. In December, it was honored by Berkeley's Yoga Journal magazine for helping make yoga "come alive in the world."
Yoga Inside began with gang members in Southern California juvenile- detention facilities. The "inside" refers to incarceration.
"But it has a double meaning," Stephens said. "It also refers to taking yoga within you. At no point in time was there a connection to Intel. It never even crossed my mind."
It seems improbable that a company of Intel's heft -- it's No. 41 on the Fortune 500 -- could get all worked up about a relatively unknown provider of yoga lessons, especially one that's so clearly fighting the good fight, karmawise.
But when Stephens registered the Yoga Inside trademark in September 2000, it didn't take Intel long to unleash its lawyers.
In documents filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Intel notes that the "Intel Inside" logo appears on "millions and millions" of computers around the world, and that the company has spent "billions of dollars" promoting the phrase.
Because of this, Intel argues, the linguistic construction "(Blank) Inside, " whether concerning state-of-the-art technology or a centuries-old spiritual practice, should uniquely belong to the chipmaker.
Intel attorney Scott Schwartz followed up with a letter to Stephens in September expressing "Intel's concern as well as the basis for a determination that 'Yoga Inside' is likely to cause confusion with and/or dilute Intel's trademark rights."
He said the "instant recognition and appeal" of the "blank inside" format stems from "Intel's enormous investment of over a decade of time and money."
Schwartz could not be reached for comment. But Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy said the company knows it could come off looking to some like a bully.
"We're certainly sensitive about that," he said. "But our hands are tied because of the way the law is structured."
Mulloy said the nature of trademark law requires a vigorous defense of one's brand at all times, whether or not the perceived violator competes in the same industry.
"We can't let a precedent be set," he explained. " 'Yoga Inside' might not sound bad, but what happens when someone comes along with 'Apple Inside'?
"If you filed a trademark for your-name-Inside," Mulloy told me, "we'd probably do the same thing."
So who's right here? That's a tough call, said Dan Richardson, a San Francisco lawyer specializing in copyright and trademark issues. "Both sides have rights," he said.
First off, it may be difficult for Intel to argue that consumers would confuse its own high-tech offerings with Yoga Inside's educational services.
"Under trademark law, you can have the same mark in different classes as long as both marks would not encounter the same consumers," Richardson said.
At the same time, the Trademark Dilution Act adopted by Congress in 1995 is specifically intended to protect the famous brands of major U.S. corporations. The law seeks to safeguard well-established brands from upstarts even in unrelated industries.
Richardson said Intel's attorneys will almost certainly claim that "Intel Inside" falls under this protection.
On the other hand, he said courts tend to focus on the "prominent feature" of a brand in determining whether the value of a trademark has been undermined.
"To my mind, the prominent feature of 'Intel Inside' is 'Intel,' not 'Inside,' " Richardson said. " 'Yoga Inside' doesn't threaten that."
This is clearly a case with a hornet's nest of legal conundrums. And so far,
both Intel and Yoga Inside remain keen not to stir up that nest with litigation.
Intel's solution is for Yoga Inside to change its name, with the chipmaker covering some or all of the costs involved. "If they went with 'Inside Yoga,' we wouldn't have a problem," Mulloy said.
Stephens at Yoga Inside has a different answer. He thinks Intel should embrace his foundation and become its primary corporate patron. The chipmaker, after all, already offers yoga classes to employees at its Silicon Valley headquarters.
"They could extend their philanthropy," Stephens said. "We'd be very happy with their sponsorship."
Barring that -- and Stephens admits it's a long shot -- he said he's not sure if an amicable resolution is possible. "I'm prepared to go forward with the process and let the chips fall where they may," he said.
If it would help, though, Stephens said he'd be more than happy to provide some free yoga lessons for Intel's executives and attorneys.
"It's astounding to me how rigid they are on this issue," he said. "A class or two would probably be a good thing." |
