Liquidweb and domains featuring liquid

[JDiggity]

So there was a discussion over at wht where liquidweb claims that they own the trademark to any domain that is involved with hosting with the word liquid in it.  I know that there is one host here who has Heroic in thier name here and again liquidweb claims to have that trademarked for any domain in hosting that includes that. 

I know there is another host here with liquid in thier domain name, are any of these hosts worried about being sued?

 

[JDiggity]

Alex_LiquidHost has the name liquid and of couse heroicvps has heroic.  What are the chances of them getting sued by liquidweb? Remote?

 

[mnpeep]

Alex_LiquidHost has the name liquid and of couse heroicvps has heroic.  What are the chances of them getting sued by liquidweb? Remote?

I would think the chances of them being bought out by liquidweb are higher than that of being sued, that is, if the company grows to the point where it is a rival of liquidweb.

 

[JDiggity]

Well Heroicvps was warned in the thread on wht by Liquidweb that the use of that name infringed, the provider bought a different domain but instead is still marketing it here as Heroicvps.  Alex may not know about this but I was just think do any of the name of any providers here infringe on it.

 

[Aldryic C'boas]

They can 'trademark' all they want, the ONLY thing that signifies is officializing the date that they started using a particular brand, word, or phrase.  Unless they actually hold copyright on very specific terms (You can't copyright common words and attempt a blanket effect on similar terminology), they can't do a thing.

Example:  Say someone trademarks AND copyrights 'HeroicVPS'.  This copyright will not apply to 'Heroic Servers' simply because it happens to contain the word Heroic.  I mean hell, look at how many restaurant chains end in the word "Burger", or start with the same adjective.

 

[JDiggity]

@[member='Aldryic C'bo

 

[Aldryic C'boas]

@[member='Aldryic C'bo

 

[mikho]

When they make a legitimate claim I'll start to worry. Not before.

 

[vanarp]

Even WordPress has something like this and so people had to start using wp.

http://wordpress.org/about/domains/

 

[Licensecart]

Well I suppose they could, Cadburys in the UK have trademarked the Purple wrapping paper, so no other company can use that.

Washing up liquid would be in trouble if they did though lol.

 

[jarland]

Then they're simply full of shit. The definitions of trademark and copyright make that plain as day.

I think they could have a legitimate case for it. I think you might be confusing copyright. Trademark is an entirely different beast. Each case has to be evaluated for what it is, and given that neither "heroic" nor "liquid" are at all relevant words to describe items of this particular market segment, they are quite likely enforceable trademarks.

To be clear, as defined from the US Patent & Trademark office: "A service mark is a word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of a service rather than goods."


The law is intentionally a bit vague because blanket concrete rules would be incompatible with new or changing markets and therefore subject to even more abuse than they currently are. I think that this case would at least be strongly considered.

 

[Ishaq]

 

 

[Coastercraze]

Maybe this will help clear things up a bit:

http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/enforcing-trademark-rights-29902.html

<3 Nolo

 

[InertiaNetworks-John]

Ouch! Maybe I should trademark the word web, that way I can sue liquidweb! 

 

[Marc M.]

I wonder if LiquidWeb also runs WHT to some degree. Wouldn't really surprise me.

 

[Coastercraze]

I wonder if LiquidWeb also runs WHT to some degree. Wouldn't really surprise me.

They do not to my knowledge. They just provide the infrastructure in exchange for advertising kickbacks.

 

[Reece-DM]

If that's the case and they don't want people stealing there domains why not buy them all so it cannot happen. Considering there a multi-million dollar business I'm quite shocked.