A California court has denied Apple's request for a preliminary injunction against Amazon.com, which would have stopped the online retailer from using the term 'Appstore'.
Apple was of the mind that Amazon's Appstore -- which sells Android apps -- was likely to "confuse and mislead customers". It asked the courts to lay the smack down on Amazon back in March.
But a federal judge wasn't convinced. "First, Apple has not established that its 'App Store' mark is famous, in the sense of being 'prominent' and 'renowned'.
"However, there is also evidence that the term 'app store' is used by other companies as a descriptive term for a place to obtain software applications for mobile devices."
We reckon the first request was a bit rich. Apple's App Store might be the most popular app portal around, but the idea that no other company could give a 'store' where you could buy 'apps' the same label is a little ludicrous. Amazon countersued Apple in April, saying that the term 'app store' is too generic.
Apple responded to that lawsuit by counter-countersuing (keeping up?), denying that 'app store' is generic, and "on that basis, denies that the Amazon Appstore for Android service is an 'app store'".
Meow! Apple's lawyers have clearly been taking their vitamins -- the Cupertino tech giant is also working on blocking the sale of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet in the US.
Is Apple being altogether too litigious? Or should they own the term 'app store'? Set us straight in the comments, or let fly on our Facebook wall.
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Comments 11
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Anonymous 7 July, 2011 13:02
An App to me is software that is written to run on a smart phone. This argument of Apple's is foolish and a waste of everybody's time and money.
Anonymous 7 July, 2011 13:15
Apple are stupid, they just want to dominate the market which they are currently losing.
jagman9310 7 July, 2011 13:21
Yeah, I am not exactly sure in what way Apple are 'losing', considering they seem to be dominating every market they enter. But yes, it is a waste of time, not least Apple's, who could spend it getting rid of Ping, for example.
Anonymous 7 July, 2011 13:22
Yes, this is way too litigious by Apple.
App is a shortening of the word application, in this context meaning a piece of software. The term has become widely known to mean a useful piece of software to add to your smart phone.
An App Store is therefore somewhere you can buy apps, of any origin be it Apple or elsewhere.
Get over it, Apple! Other people make smart phones and apps for them, and sell them too!
Anonymous 7 July, 2011 13:24
An application is a piece of software, regardless of platform, therefore AppStore is where they sell such pieces of software. Stop being petty Apple
Anonymous 7 July, 2011 14:05
@jagman9310 Apple are most certainly not dominating the phone market. Apple have far less market share than Android, about the same as blackberry.
Anonymous 7 July, 2011 14:06
@jagman9310 They aint 'dominating' get ur facts straight, fanboy!
Anonymous 7 July, 2011 15:02
I hate Apple and anything that starts with "i"!
Anonymous 7 July, 2011 15:26
I love Apple products but hate their policies.
Greediest company on the planet.
To create an app you have to buy software from Apple.
Then they take 30% of the sales.
If the product is good like eg Yak then they copy that technology and bung it into their next OS - as they are doing with OS5.
member123 11 July, 2011 09:17
nooo... how can Apple lose
Anonymous 13 July, 2011 15:25
Losers. I'm glad the judge saw sense. If only consumers would smarten up and throw out all the iJunk.