Ridiculous news of the day! Rupert Murdoch of News Corp (FOX News) is suing Skype over trademark infringement. Apparently, Rupert's BSkyB company is suing over trademark infringement for sharing 3 letters and a very common word with Skype - namely 'sky'. What's next? Trademarking 2 letters? Why not 1 letter. I'm going to trademark the entire alphabet, what do you think of that?This is a battle that has been going on for 5 years but became public knowledge when Skype mentioned it in their 250 page IPO document after announcing their IPO.
Check out the news excerpt:
A spokesman for Sky, which is 39.1pc-owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, said the company was trying to prevent Skype from using its trademark in relation to the sale of TV or internet service, because customer might assume that 'Skype' is part of Sky.
"Sky is involved in a long-running dispute with Skype in relation to several trade mark applications filed by Skype, including, but not limited to, television-related goods and services," the spokesman said. "The key contention in the dispute is that the brands 'Sky' and 'Skype' will be considered confusingly similar by members of the public."
Sky said its concerns were supported by consumer research.
Last month, Sky's case for "trademark infringement" was upheld by the European Union's Office for Harmonisation of Internal Markets (OHIM), which ruled that Skype's trademark and its famous blue bubble logo were too similar to Sky's name and branding.
Are you serious? I never even heard of "Sky" and I certainly don't think of "Sky" when I think of "Skype". In fact, I don't even think of that "wild blue yonder" above my head (the blue sky) when I think of Skype, which is above my head wherever I go. Even though "sky" is in the word "Skype", when I first heard the word Skype, it just sounded like a new 'edgy' word that someone came up with.
So let me get this straight, Sky has a trademark on anything with the word 'sky' in it? Ok, Mr. Murdoch, how bout suing Skyfire, the mobile browser then? Or how bout Skynet from the Terminator? You really want to take on Arnold Schwarzenegger? Or how about the the General Motors Saturn Sky vehicle? You really want to take on General Motors, which by the way is owned by President Obama and the government. You really want to tick off the Obama Zombies? They're already peeved at you Mr. Murdoch for FOX News kicking CNN and MSNBC's ass every night in the ratings, so don't be rattling their cages. They'll eat your brains man. Don't do it!]]>