By Apple recently tried to sue cmopetitor Amazon over their usage of the phrase “App Store”, which Apple says is theirs, and trademark protected.
Back in March, when Amazon started to use this market in order to sell Android apps, Apple filed a suit against the company saying that it “denies that the mark App Store is generic and, on that basis, denies that the Amazon Appstore for Android service is an ‘app store.’” They also tried to make their point by saying that the Amazon service is potentially insecure, as users are asked for their passwords when shopping on the Amazon Appstore.
The “original”, Apple’s App Store.
But the main thorn in Apple’s paw was the fact that users might confuse the two products, and that basically theirs is better. Amazon countersued in April, saying that the App Store name is far too generic, and people would confuse between the two terms anyway.
The conclusion to this lawsuit came yesterday, and it’s in favor of Amazon. As the official announcement says, “The court finds that Apple has not established a likelihood of success on its dilution claim. First, Apple has not established that its “App Store” mark is famous, in the sense of being “prominent” and “renowned.”
And the one that gets to keep its title: Amazon.
This is only one battle in Apple’s continuous war to keep what’s theirs. Recently, they even tried to patent the number ’280′, simply because it appeared on the Google Maps icon for iPhones.
