I am lost? What the hell is this post supposed to be about, you have 57 posts and you don't know who owns adwords or adsense. Has the satellite dish outside of your cave being playing up for the past 5 years????
No need to be negative guys and let the owner of thread down. Everybody has a right to learn and lack some knowledge that could be obvious to some but certainly not to all!
some people always believe what is in front of them, after a conversation about adwords my friends Grandfather said that he remembers Adwords from his Trademark business days, and says that his company registered adwords as a trademark by mistake. his company should have registered adworks, but ye old typewriter must have caused a problem with a typo. he reckons they registered adworks after realising their mistake, but did nothing with adwords, so it is still registered to his company. he will be sorting through his archives this week to prove it...
Well, that's easy enough to check. You can search the European Union trademark database here, UK registered trademark database here and the US registered trademark database here. - in the EU the only hit for "Adwords" is registered to Google for "Dissemination of advertising for others. " A person named Hong Wu is trying to register "Adwordshare", but that has been opposed. - two hits for "Adwords" come up in the UK search (one which appears to be the EU registration), but the database seems to be down at the moment so I don't have details - the only hit for "Adwords" in the US search is a term registered by Google, which covers the term "Dissemination of advertising for others via the Internet" It may be that the grandfatherly gentleman did indeed register the word "Adwords", but it would just be a curiosity, rather than something that would impact Google's use of the term: - He would have had to register the term "Adwords" for the same usage as Google's use - It would have had to have been used in the normal course of business (and it sounds like an "accidental" registration would never have been used) - trademarks have to be renewed every 10 years in the UK and in the US. Again, unlikely if the registration was non-intentional. Even if the term "adwords" was registered by his company at some time in the past, it's currently registered to Google. (And you asked "who owns these systems" (answer: Google), which is a different question than "does Google own these trademarks".)
Excellent post and information shared! very fast also .. I was about to ask if he could hussle Google for a few million but guess not after reading the last few lines of your post. thx m1
And now the UK database is working, and here is the Adwords trademark: http://www.ipo.gov.uk/domestic?domesticnum=2442043 It's indeed registered to Google, for "Dissemination of advertising for others via the Internet; advertising; business management; business administration; office functions; data mining and data analysing services; consultancy, advisory and information services relating to the aforesaid services." Google has been in a number of trademark disputes over the term "Gmail". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gmail#Trademark_disputes Apparently in the UK a deal was worked out with the original trade mark holder and Google started using "Gmail" again last month. Interestingly in the US, the person who originally registered "Gmail" failed to respond to an inquiry from the Trademark Office, so the mark became "Abandoned" and Google could register it for themselves. That's what usually happens when a term is trademarked, but not actively in use - it becomes abandoned, and another business can register it.
Since all the trademark databases in the US, UK and EU all indicate that the mark is registered to Google, I assume that he registered it a different country or has been using it in business but doesn't have it registered (a common-law trademark). If he is in the US, UK or EU, he would have to file the papers to get the registration taken away from Google. It'll be interesting to see if the lawyers think he has a case.