Steve has posted several times on "brand baiting" gimmicks–typically involving spam-type e-mails with enticing pictures or offers of well-known products or brands as rewards for "participation" . . . in, well, God knows what. (Steve’s previous posts here, here, and here.) Take a glance at them just to get the principle, then tell us what… Continue Reading
Tag Archives: Affiliate Marketing
Seth Godin on Trademark?
Posted in Branding, Dilution, Famous Marks, Idea Protection, Infringement, Law Suits, Marketing, Search Engines, TrademarksSeth Godin has an amazing knack for creating and spreading ideas that matter, mostly really good ones, by the way. I always look forward to his daily riffs and I have been known to spread some of his important ideas too when they overlap with things I happen to care a lot about. When it comes to Mr…. Continue Reading
iPad, the Latest Brand Bait?
Posted in Advertising, Branding, Dilution, Fair Use, Famous Marks, Infringement, Marketing, Product Configurations, Sight, TrademarksPutting aside, for now, the unsettled question of who currently owns the iPad trademark, and Dan’s perspective on Apple’s trademark clearance strategies, from last week, look at what our finely-tuned e-mail spam filter just snagged: It is a similar story to my previous Free Dell XPS Laptop Spam Scam? blog post from last December. Here, however, the Apple, iPad, and the (possible) iPad configuration… Continue Reading
Is Wal-Mart Giving Away Free $1,000 Gift Cards?
Posted in Advertising, Branding, Fair Use, Infringement, Marketing, TrademarksSame drill as yesterday. Another email spam scam? More trademark fair use abuse? Is it just me, or is the branded email spam coming out of the virtual woodwork, or what? It appears that spam email – complete with fully branded solicitations — is becoming more and more aggressive, both from legal and technology perspectives. We… Continue Reading
Free Dell XPS Laptop Spam Scam?
Posted in Advertising, Fair Use, Marketing, TrademarksWhat if you were told that if you agreed to "test" a Dell XPS laptop you could keep it, for free? Would you expect the offer to be from Dell Computer? After all, who else but the manufacturer would care to give a computer away for simply having you test it? Would you at least expect… Continue Reading
Affiliate Marketing
Posted in Advertising, Domain Names, Food, Guest Bloggers, Infringement, Law Suits, Marketing, TrademarksTrademark Infringement is a sticky subject online. Our first blog talked about Twitter and trademark infringement and today I want to address trademark infringement in relation to affiliate marketing. Affiliate Marketing is a process that rewards a blog or website for every customer that is brought to the company (the affiliate) that blog or website… Continue Reading









