Microsoft claims that San Diego, California-based Lindows.com’s name infringes its Windows trademark and has been operating a long-running campaign to secure injunctions against the company, with mixed success.
Microsoft failed to persuade a US Court to grant an injunction, and indeed suffered the ignominy of the judge hearing the case casting doubt on whether the company should have been allowed to trademark the word windows at all.
The company has been successful in Europe, however, having been granted injunctions preventing Lindows.com from operating under its name in Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. In February the Linux vendor began operating under the name Lin—s.com (pronounced Lindash) in those countries.
That name is still too close to Lindows for Microsoft’s liking, according to papers filed with the Dutch court asking it to fine Lindows.com for alleged violation of the original preliminary injunction.
With respect to the designation ‘Lin—s’ it is unmistakable that the three dashes should be read as d, o and w, stated Microsoft in the filing. Considering the great resemblance between Lin—s and Windows, given the explicit reference to Lindows, Microsoft is of the opinion that Lin—s also infringes its trademark rights.
Lindows.com has now removed the Lin—s.com web site pending its appeal against the preliminary injunction, which is scheduled for March 30, but Microsoft also claims that Lindows.com has failed to prevent people from Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxemburg visiting its Lindows.com web site, prompting a dismissive response from the Linux distributor.
Since visitors to our web site come from international ISPs, proxy servers, anonymizers and other methods, it is impossible for us to comply with such a broad order to block all visitors from Benelux, and Microsoft knows this, said Michael Robertson, Lindows.com CEO. We have completely withdrawn our products from these markets and put notices on every page of our web site.
The request for a 100,000 euro per day fine certainly goes way beyond the potential penalty for failure to comply with the original preliminary injunction, which order 1,000 euros ($1,222) for each day that Lindows.com failed to comply, up to a maximum of 90,000 euros ($110,000).
The US trademark infringement case is currently delayed while Microsoft prepares to appeal the Judge’s ruling that the jury should consider whether the word windows is generic, based on the period between 1983 and 1985 before Microsoft released its products. In February Microsoft also launched a trademark infringement claim against the desktop Linux vendor in Canada.
This article is based on material originally published by ComputerWire
