I stumbled across Shari Thurow’s site today and noticed that she was using a ™ on the phrase “search usability.” That is such a standard industry phrase, that I thought it must be some kind of mistake, so I searched for it at the USPTO.
Sure enough, there was a trademark filed by Shari last May for the phrase “search usability.” Apparently, Shari feels she invented that phrase and should have legal rights to it. I wonder what Jakob Nielson thinks about that? As far as I can tell, he was the first to publish content on the web talking about search usability.
Fortunately, it looks like the USPTO is going to deny the registration. I’m not sure why Shari thought it would be worth the time and money to pursue it. She tried a few years ago to register a trademark for the term TrafficNode, and was unsuccessful. If you can’t get approval for a term that actually is fairly original, how could you come to the conclusion that you stood a chance with something like search usability?
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8 Responses to “ “Search Usability” Owned by Shari Thurow? ”
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You think that is stupid, their is a company that thinks it has exclusive right to the word “entrepreneur” The worst part is they were able to trick the trademark office into giving them the mark and use brutal tactics against anyone who attemps to challange them. Update, not on my site yet MARKVA got dragged out of the USPTO and into federal court and was forced to give up because of lack of funds.
Some people like to build fences around things
Shari got burned!
jakob would be laughin at that one for sure
silly ppl and their trademarks
Honestly… what is wrong with people doing stuff like that! As you quite rightly put, the un-successful application for TrafficNode should have taught her a lesson.
I’m all for the “if you don’t ask, you don’t get” attitude but that’s taking it into a new dimension!
Can someone try trademarking Shari Thurow???
This makes me wonder if Jill Whalen ever tried trademarking the term “Web Whiz.”
Gentlemen (and ladies)-
If you have a question, just ask me. All of your assumptions about my trademarks and copyrights are completely inaccurate.
Prof. Nielsen and I have considerably different definitions as to what constitutes search usability.
It is really not that hard to send me an email or call me if you have a question.