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Google steps up anti-Google campaign
Google is getting more serious about its "stop googling" campaign.
The search provider on Wednesday put up a blog posting, urging internet users to stop using the word "google" to refer to performing an online search.
Google last summer launched a similar bid with media organisations. At the time Google requested to refrain from using the company name as a verb altogether. Yesterday's blog posting merely asks to save 'to google' exclusively for searches on Google.
At stake is Google's trademark. Once a decent percentage of the world's population starts saying: "I googled the shop for some tomatoes, but they were out," there is no way to prevent a maker of navigation systems to launch an ad campaign that states: "We'll do you're googling for you." And a porn site or Yahoo could do the same.
But language is a living cultural being that doesn't respect trademark laws.
The makers of scotch tape or trampolines will tell you that it doesn’t hurt to be genericized. But try explaining that to the makers of spam (the canned kind).
technorati tags: google, to+google, verb, trademark, commodity
October 26, 2006 at 10:09 PM | Permalink
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