You may never think about the use of the word “book” in quite the same way now that social networking giant, Facebook, has filed a trademark infringement suit against start-up Teachbook, which is set to debut this fall.
Teachbook, “an online community for teachers,” promises features Facebook users may be familiar with like profiles and communication tools including chat, discussion groups and resource sharing. Facebook, in court documents, claims trademark infringement, unfair competition and trademark dilution and wants profits, damages and the Teachbook domain name transferred over to them.
Wired reported Teachbook’s response: “It’s a David and Goliath situation,” said Greg Shrader, the managing partner of the Northbrook, Illinois-base Teachbook, which has yet to launch. ”They’re throwing bombs at a mosquito. They believe we’re going to roll over and in some respect they get to own the term ‘book.’”
Apparently Facebook isn’t focusing its trademark sights solely on social networking companies. The company recently demanded that a travel site rename itself from Placebook. And TechCrunch reported that Facebook has filed a trademark application for FACE—check out a screenshot of the class 38 filing from Corsearch® Advantage™:

There are still some outliers, like Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s former Harvard classmate, Aaron Greenspan. Greenspan already owns a trademark for FACECASH which is being used as a mobile app. Fresh off of a battle with Zuckerberg over other Facebook trademarks last year, Greenspan has filed an extension with the TTAB for the purposes of opposition of the FACE mark.
You know what they say: “A good book has no ending”… so stay tuned.
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