Someone on this forum is using my trademark to advertise

So I'm pretty new around here, but I just noticed that every time someone mentions the name of my product, UBot Studio, it links to the site of one of my competitors (who's product isn't as good). This is a trademark of my company. How can I get the situation remedied?

 

Looks like someone has bought an ad triggered by that word. I am not sure of the current state of the law in that regard, but it seems like you have two options, regardless.

1. Ask them to stop using your trademark term to trigger their ads.

2. Sue them to force them to stop.

If it were me, I would be spending my time on option 1. Option 2 sounds like a waste of time and money.

 

You can send a cease and desist letter regarding your trademark.

 

You mean like someone bought a Google AdWord ad using someone's trademark? This just
in:

http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/california/cacdce/2:2007cv02760/387682/200/

This decision is quite ironic.

 

Going to read it now. Looks like I used to work with (send some cases to) one of the parties.

Interesting read. The advertiser, using someone else trademark to trigger their ads, got their ass handed to them including an award of attorney's fees.

 

What they do is damaging your benefits, so you should ask them to deal with this issue, if they don't give you a reasonable answer, you can sue them to protect your own interests.

 

thanks for the link! very helpful. what I mean is that digital point has some kind of in line text advertising so that every time someone mentions a certain word, it links it to the ad. Look at the word UBot in this sentence, and click the link. That's one of my competitors. They have an inferior product and they're using my trademark to advertise it.

does anyone know who's in charge of those ads on here? maybe I ca =n just ask them to remove it.

 

I would send them a letter (email is fine too) requesting that they stop using your word to trigger their ad. I would tell them that courts have found people doing exactly that liable for that very thing. I would link that case so he can read himself.

Of course, I would also make sure I really owned the trademark:

I didn't see any other live trademarks for that word. The reality is that you need to persuade the other person it is in both his and your best interest for him to stop. The chances of this ending up in a lawsuit are close to nil so whether you have a registered trademark or a claim to a common law trademark is almost immaterial. If you can't get him to stop on his own, the cost of going to court would be prohibitive unless you were losing tens of thousands of dollars due to this and even then its not a case you want to bring.

 

I seem to recall that Google actually STOPPED trying to enforce trademark compliance in adwords, and that it's basically open season now.

 

Whether or not Google allows it does not make it legal for another company to do. Google is not the arbiter of what is legal and not legal.

In the case linked above, the party chose to sue the competitor doing the advertising and not Google itself. The party using adwords lost $250,000 so, the fact that Google let them do it wasn't much of a defense to the trademark violation.

 

Great find. Very helpful.