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Microsoft, handset makers take "App Store" trademark fight to EU

Microsoft and several major handset makers, including HTC, Nokia and Sony Ericsson, are now opposing Apple's trademark of the term "App Store" in the European Union for being generic.

Microsoft has lodged a formal application for declaration of invalidity of the "App Store and "Appstore" trademarks with the EU's Community Trade Mark office, the Digital Daily blog reports. The Redmond, Wash., search giant is joined by HTC, Nokia and Sony Ericsson in opposing the trademark in the EU.

"Microsoft and other leading technology companies are seeking to invalidate Apple’s trademark registration for APP STORE and APPSTORE because we believe that they should not have been granted because they both lack distinctiveness,” a Microsoft spokesperson said in a statement. “The undisputed facts establish that ‘app store’ means exactly what it says, a store offering apps, and is generic for the services that the registrations cover.”

Apple filed for the "App Store" trademark in July 2008 within weeks of launching the iPhone App Store. The trademark applies to "retail store services featuring computer software provided via the internet and other computer and electronic communication networks; Retail store services featuring computer software for use on handheld mobile digital electronic devices and other consumer electronics," as well as the "electronic transmission of data via the internet" and "maintenance, repair and updating of computer software."

In January, Microsoft filed an opposition to the mark with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, alleging the term is generic and unregisterable. Apple responded by noting that the "Windows" mark is generic.

"Having itself faced a decades-long genericness challenge to its claimed WINDOWS mark, Microsoft should be well aware that the focus in evaluating genericness is on the mark as a whole and requires a fact-intensive assessment of the primary significance of the term to a substantial majority of the relevant public," Apple wrote.

"Yet, Microsoft, missing the forest for the trees, does not base its motion on a comprehensive evaluation of how the relevant public understands the term APP STORE as a whole."

A day before Amazon launched its Amazon Appstore digital application storefront for Android, Apple filed a suit against the company for violating its trademark. Amazon responded by joining Microsoft in opposition to the mark, also claiming that the trademark is a generic term.

Both Apple and Microsoft have employed the use of linguistic experts to argue their claims for and against the trademark. Apple has also sought to defend its trademark from a pornography store on the Android Market.

55 Comments

jragosta 18 Years · 10472 comments

The people at Microsoft are idiots.

How could "Windows" or "Office" be valid trademarks while "App Store" is too generic?

orlando 16 Years · 601 comments

Quote:
Originally Posted by jragosta

How could "Windows" or "Office" be valid trademarks while "App Store" is too generic?

Windows is a generic word but it is unique in being used to describe an operating system. You don't say "Windows" to refer in general to GUIs or Operating Systems. If you say "Windows" everyone knows you are talking about the Microsoft product.

However, people use AppStore very generically to describe all of the different app stores. Say AppStore and people might think you are talking about Apple, Google, Microsoft etc. I find most people say iOS or iPhone AppStore so others know they are talking about the Apple one.

steven n. 14 Years · 1229 comments

Quote:
Originally Posted by Orlando

Windows is a generic word but it is unique in being used to describe an operating system. You don't say "Windows" to refer in general to GUIs or Operating Systems. If you say "Windows" everyone knows you are talking about the Microsoft product.

However, people use AppStore very generically to describe all of the different app stores. Say AppStore and people might think you are talking about Apple, Google, Microsoft etc. I find most people say iOS or iPhone AppStore so others know they are talking about the Apple one.

All of my friends with Android handsets (without exception) refer to the "Android Market" or the "Marketplace". None of them ever refer to the Android Market by the App Store.

Windows is a very generic term for a GUI based system. For example X11 Window Manager. Not an OS but it shows that Windows is descriptive and generic.

Likewise, show me the references to "App Store" prior to 2008? Prior to Windows, I can find lots of references to OSes and the term "windows".

applesauce007 18 Years · 1711 comments

Quote:
Originally Posted by Orlando

... I find most people say iOS or iPhone AppStore so others know they are talking about the Apple one.

That is not true. People do not say iOS AppStore, they just say AppStore to refer to Apple instead of AndroidMarket to refer to Google for example.

Apple will win this regardless of what the copy cats try to do.

Time will tell.

robin huber 23 Years · 4065 comments

Quote:
Originally Posted by Orlando

However, people use AppStore very generically to describe all of the different app stores.

Yeah, they do now, after Apple coined the term and opened the first App Store.