U.S. appeals court upholds critic's use of trademark in URL

[Chris Chiu]

A Federal appeals court in the United States has ruled in favor of Joseph Maxwell, who set up a website (formerly located at www.TrendMakerHome.com) that criticized a home building company, TMI, Inc. The court specifically held that the disgruntled customer's use of TMI's trademark "TrendMaker Homes" in his website's address was legal, largely because it was noncommercial and because Maxwell did not have any bad faith intent to profit from the use of the term.

See
http://www.internetdemocracyproject.org/#highlights

Sincerely,
Christopher Chiu
Technology Policy Analyst
American Civil Liberties Union