DirecTV, Dish engage in war of keywords

[Scott Greczkowski]

DirecTV, Dish engage in war of keywords

Companies take dispute over Internet search terms to court

By Joyzelle Davis, Rocky Mountain News
December 29, 2006

DirecTV and EchoStar's Dish Network have gone to court in a dispute over the use of Internet search-engine keywords, one of the hottest areas in advertising and murkiest corners of trademark law.

DirecTV last month sent smaller satellite-TV rival EchoStar a letter threatening a trademark infringement suit over EchoStar's practice of buying the keyword DirecTV to trigger the appearance of sponsored links to EchoStar advertisements.

Douglas County-based EchoStar countered by heading to court to seek a ruling declaring that it was in the clear. Buying DirecTV as a keyword is "akin to comparative advertising, which fosters competition and aids consumers in making informed marketplace choices," EchoStar argued in papers filed in New York federal court.

The dispute illustrates the intersection of one of the fastest-growing areas of advertising with the less nimble rule of law. Search advertising will exceed Internet display advertising for the first time this year, according to Jupiter Research, which estimates that the search ad market will double to $11.1 billion in 2011, up from $5.1 billion last year.

"The law always lags behind technology, and if you think of what Google does, it's really unique in the history of civilization," said Andrew Burt, director of the Institute for Digital Security. "It's like if you called a librarian and said, 'Could you fax me everything you can find about DirecTV,' and the librarian includes an advertisement for Dish."

Read the rest at http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/tech/article/0,2777,DRMN_23910_5243215,00.html

 

[Tom Bombadil]

E* is at it again. They are always pushing at the boundaries.

But D* was very much asleep at the wheel if they let E* do this before they got around to it.

 

[Smthkd]

E* is a sad sight! Do they have abunch of criminals working for them trying to bend the law anyway they can. This is rediculous! Charlie has dipped to an all time low!

 

[navychop]

This is not unusual. Other companies do it. Ad placement- you put ads where you expect the best results.

 

[riffjim4069]

What's next...dial 911 and be connected to a Dish Network CSR? The term "Cheese Dick" is appropriate for such behavior...

 

[Tampa8]

Some of you give me a good chuckle reading your posts. Do you really think Dish invented this and other companies don't do it? GMC (Pontiac specifically) has done this for quite sometime. The travel sites do it. Pansonic shows up often when I am searching on Sony.

 

[Jim5506]

Not unlike dialing 1-888-333-Dish and getting DirecTV instead of Dish - EH!

 

[Slamminc11]

Some of you give me a good chuckle reading your posts. Do you really think Dish invented this and other companies don't do it? GMC (Pontiac specifically) has done this for quite sometime. The travel sites do it. Pansonic shows up often when I am searching on Sony.

Don't forget all those porn sites that do it too!

 

[BrianB]

Go to google and search DISH network. See how many DirecTV dealers come up. This is something that all kinds of companies do.

 

[retorq]

This has been tested before in court, some model and Playboy went head to head. They sided with the model, she went as far as to put the word "playboy" and "playmate" in her meta tags for Google and other search engines to pick up. It's nothing new or illegal. Maybe shady at best.

 

[ThomasRz]

This is not unusual. Other companies do it. Ad placement- you put ads where you expect the best results.

This is different. Let's say you own and operate "Navychop Widgets," with all the necessary copyright, trademark, etc. protection. Your only competition is "Ernie's Widgets." Ernie constructs things so that the following point to his website:
Navychip/Mavychip/Mavychop/Bavychop/Naveechop/Navychoo/Navycjip/etc.......
He is infringing on your trademark because (1) you are in the same type of business (widgets) (2) there is a substantial likelihood of consumer confusion (which is what Ernie intended). If you don't think this is a problem try opening a hamburger restaurant and point to your website using McDonaldz, McDinalds, MacDonalds, etc. The next knock on the door will be the delivery of legal papers.

 

[navychop]

Naw. It's done all the time.

 

[long_time_DNC]

Go to google and search DISH network. See how many DirecTV dealers come up. This is something that all kinds of companies do.

In the sponsored links, DirecTV links showed up for 4 different sites on the first page of returned hits.

Yep, it's a nasty business out there...

 

[minnow]

Another lawsuit we as subscribers are paying for. Just think how many new services or upgrades or maybe even , dare I say it; go a year without a the regular subscription cost increase if E* took just half of the amount of money they spend on lawyers and reinvest it in the customer.

E* spends so much on lawyers that we subsidize through our monthly subscriptions that I almost feel that I personally have a gaggle of attorneys on retainer.

 

[long_time_DNC]

Now that's the best summation I've heard of the E* litigations I've heard yet!

 

[Cornstalkk]

What's next...dial 911 and be connected to a Dish Network CSR? The term "Cheese Dick" is appropriate for such behavior...

Just imagine trying to explain your address and emergency to someone from India!!

 

[David Dietzel]

Dish ain't do'n anythang wrong here.

 

[dishcomm]

E* is at it again. They are always pushing at the boundaries.

But D* was very much asleep at the wheel if they let E* do this before they got around to it.

Why not..If you can get your opponenet to fold a beter hand then do it..Charlie's action may be skirting the spirit of any regulation but copyright infringement is for a jury to decide....
What this move by E* reminds me of is the old practice of "cybersquatting"..The practice of buying a domain name of a well known company and selling the name to the company at a huge profit...

 

[retorq]

Cybersquatting is different then using meta tags, meta tags aren't visible to the normal person, a domain name is. Meta tags are like thoughts, when someone bites into a burger and says "Hmm this tastes like McDonalds" that's similar to a meta tag. If you wrap your burgers in the old stryofoam containers with a big M and a clown on it, that would be similar to stealing the domain name.

 

[StanUbankit]

E* spends so much on lawyers that we subsidize through our monthly subscriptions that I almost feel that I personally have a gaggle of attorneys on retainer.[/QUOTE]

O.K., how many is a "gaggle"?, more than a flock, less than a herd?
Reminds me of (several years ago) when lawyers in Texas were able to start advertising one of the firms briefly used a slogan llike, "We make money the old fashioned way, we sue for it". Think they got slammed real quickly by a bigger gaggle of lawyers from the brokerage firm (Smith Barney?) that originated it.