This is definitely one of those "only in America" moments…
Apparently, TigerDirect (hereafter the Butt-Head Vendor) are suing Apple over the codename for their OS X 10.4 release… Whaffuk!?
The Butt-Head Vendor is obviously staffed by cretins whose wallets aren’t fat enough and who have been taking mind-altering drugs provided by copyright and trademark lawyers. When this gets to court, I hope the judge awards costs against the Butt-Head Vendor.
Story via Slashdot.
I dunno… on the surface, it looks like a wholly reasonable lawsuit. A relatively small company works to build up a trademark over the course of many years, and then a bigger company tries to swoop in and commandeer the name.
Trust me, if another computer company tried to use the name “Apple” in a product, Jobs would have his lawyers out in force.
Actually, I’ve used TigerDirect for my server needs for several years now and aside from the best pricing I could find, they have provided excellent customer service.
As for the lawsuit, in order to maintain a trademark in the U.S. a company is required to defend it’s trademark. Tiger also has a trademark on TigerSoftware, so there is a very good chance that they are in the right here, and that Apple should have done more due diligence in naming the new version of the OS.
If defending a legally trademarked name makes a company a Butt-Head Vendor, then pretty much every company in the U.S. falls into that category.
I would guess that they are doing this more to get some free PR out of it than anything else. Just in this post you linked to them 3 times…
I would think Apple’s attorneys are pretty careful about checking existing trademarks before they approve a code name, but maybe TigerDirect called their bluff.
Its also interesting to note that TigerDirect sells PC’s and no Apple stuff.
After Apple’s recent lawsuits against fans, fansites, etc., one could call this cosmic justice.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=apple+sues ;)