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Facebook Claims It Owns "Face" and "Book"

Facebook went after a start-up web community for teachers called "Teachbook." Facebook's suit against the Northbrook, Illinois company (filed in San Jose, California, naturally) claims, "that the 'book' part of its name is 'highly distinctive in the context of online communities and networking websites.'"

“If others could freely use ‘generic plus BOOK’ marks for online networking services targeted to that particular generic category of individuals, the suffix BOOK could become a generic term for ‘online community/networking services’ or ’social networking services,’” Facebook argued in the lawsuit. “That would dilute the distinctiveness of the Facebook Marks.”

Teachbook, by the way, isn't up and running yet. The company has two employees and fewer than 20 would-be users.

No wonder Facebook is nervous, eh?

Then comes word that Facebook is now trying to tie up rights to the word 'face'. (I'll wait while you check the link to make sure I didn't link to The Onion by mistake.) (As you can see, I didn't make a mistake.)

But Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has. Because I am here and now claiming all rights to the use of the word "Zuckerberg." I surely have an equal right to "Zuckerberg" as Mr. Zuckerberg does to "face" and "book." And if he doesn't like it, I will smack him right across the front of that lump sticking out of his neck with a sheaf of printed pages held together with a binding.

Curmudgeon is a self-described dinosaur -- an Ozzie and Harriet person living in an Ozzy and Sharon world. And sometimes it confuses the heck out of him. He writes a very amusing blog at Second Effort.

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