Google may relent on AdWords trademark usage
Several news reports have indicated that Google is on the verge of announcing major changes to the way it handles trademark names when advertisers buy search terms that trigger the appearance of their copy. The move comes as the company is facing increasing legal pressure in the form of lawsuits that accuse it of willful trademark infringement through its adwords program. So far, however, Google hasn’t detailed precisely how the terms will change, leaving the topic open for speculation, with different commentators suggesting that the move will aggravate or placate the trademark holders.
Not that a number of them weren’t starting out pretty aggravated. The source of their ire is the AdWords program, which lets anyone bid for a trademarked name that will serve as a trigger for their ads. With little in the way of a policy on the contents of those ads, they wound up ranging from beneficial to the trademark holder—for example, a retailer could be offering their goods for sale—to various degrees of harmful. Some companies have used trademarked terms to redirect Google users to competitors products or advocacy campaigns against the business practices of the trademark holder. In some cases, the software that Google provides to help advertisers choose AdWords would apparently recommend a competitor’s trademarked name.
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