Apple is back in court in an attempt to stop Amazon from using the term ‘Appstore,’ with the charge that advertising for the online retailer’s Kindle Fire tablet misleads consumers. The tech giant wants the ads to stop, claiming they mistakenly give the impression Apple endorses the Amazon device.
“Consumers of mobile software downloads are likely to be confused as to whether Amazon’s mobile software download service is sponsored or approved by Apple or is merely a conduit for Apple’s APP STORE service,” the company’s updated lawsuit alleges. After the Kindle Fire was announced in September, Amazon switched from ‘Amazon Appstore for Android’ to just ‘Amazon Appstore,’ according to the complaint.
The amended lawsuit asks the court to order Amazon to stop, alleging the different wording caused Apple “irreparable injury” by reducing the distinctiveness of the APP STORE trademark. A California court has set an October 2012 trial date, after denying a preliminary injunction in July.
We seriously doubt the confusion in consumers’ minds exists that Apple is claiming here, but the App Store trademark is a juicy plum, and we can understand why they are fighting tooth-and-nail for it. What do you think? Is Apple in the right here? Is Amazon just jealous?
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
16 responses to “Apple Goes Mean Girl On Amazon: Stop Pretending to Be Us!”
I think they wanna keep it as “theirs” because they want their terms to be the “standard”, like sometimes when you refer to tablets you come most times with tablet = iPad as the reference, so when you refer to an online mobile software market apps, you will refer it as the “App Store”
Grocery store… can I copyright that?
Yes, but no one thought of it as “App Store” until Apple introduced it. It’s what’s fair honestly, if I opened a unique store and everyone started using a similar one and calling it the same thing, what’s the deal with that? I invented it!
Windows….can I copyright that? Oh wait, someone already did. The point here is, Apple coined the term “App Store”, so they have the right to copyright it. Just because the term is ubiquitous now doesn’t mean it’s a generic term. Apple made it ubiquitous. I don’t remember anyone using the term before Apple opened the App Store.
I don’t blame Apple for defending the “App Store” name, but I don’t think the law suit will go very far. “App” has already become a generic term meaning a software application for a tablet or smartphone, and many retailers use the word “store” in their name.
App has already become a generic term because APPLE WAS THE ONE WHO START USING IT AS A TERM! Fuck Amazon!
And what else do you want to shorten application to?
there is only one App Store…and that is Apple’s. They (Amazon and all others) should come up with their own application store name for their own