eBay Wins Court Case..Buy It Now Stays
Posted by: From Arkansas in Give Me A Break on Jul 28 2007
Welcome back!
In a fight to the finish…well, not really finished actually, eBay won the right to use the words “Buy It Now” on their buttons on the auctions. I love those buttons, by the way. They do, however, have to pay for the use in the amount of $25 million. A company in Virginia sued eBay because they had patented the use of those words on a button for their own company use.
Frankly, I am still having a problem with a patent of words that are an everyday usage. That particular company was using it on their own website. But now, while they had a case against eBay, the judge in the case says that they are not harmed in all this. They have been able to use the words and have a healthy income. eBay’s use is probably not affecting them at all.
Critics of the patent system in this country say that the small companies that hold such patents are abusing the system to get money out of the bigger companies. Seems to be working.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Trackback url for this post
No Comments
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.