Ask HN: Buying a domain with someone else's brand in the title What's the legality of using other peoples' brand names in your url. For instance http://www.googlefight.com/ http://www.google-analytics-book.com/ The first is descriptive of the service, and the second appends a product to the brand and application. Does anyone know where/how the line is drawn? gogggle.com? googleappengine.com |
As long as you are not competing in the same market and there is little or no risk that consumers will confuse your brand with that of the famous brand, derivative brands like this will often be allowed to stand. The point of the big brand owner has been made, the big brand has been defended at law, and can be defended in future against attempts at infringement. With the examples you provide, I'd suggest a 50-50 chance of success for the first one but only a 5% chance of success for the second. There's no hard and fast rule; trademark litigation can get very hand-wavey. It has to be said that some companies launch and then switch to a plan B name...after they've accrued a bunch of free publicity by incorporating the famous brand and declaring themselves to be shocked - shocked - at the subsequent legal action. It's a nice reliable David-and-Goliath story, especially effective if the David company is some little cottage industry focused on kids/kittens/kitsch.
I'm not a lawyer, and certainly not a trademark lawyer, so don't treat this as legal advice.