misleading or deceptive conduct

Does anyone think Google is advertising the sponsored links?

1 Comment / Internet, Trade, Trade marks / / / , , , , , ,

The Full Federal Court in Australia does.

The ACCC has successfully appealed the Google Adwords case for misleading and deceptive conduct.

So, for example, Alpha Dog Trainging has been operating a dogtraining business for 12 years. Dog Training Australia (Ausdog) bought ads on the keywords Alpha Dog Training through Google’s Adwords program. One ad generated was:

Alpha Dog Training 
DogTrainingAustralia.com.au All Breeds. We come to you. No dog that can’t be trained.

Instead of being taken through through to Alpha Dog Training’s website, however, a user who clicked on the ad was taken through to Ausdog’s website.

A clear case of misleading or deceptive conduct by Ausdog.

Because of its role in “selecting” which ads got placed in what order, Google has also been found liable.

Prof. King, formerly an ACCC commissioner, highlights why and thinks the Court got it seriously wrong.

Did we just kill the Internet in Australia?

ACCC v Google Inc. [2012] FCAFC 49 (Keane CJ, Jacobson and Lander JJ)

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Coffee plungers, tea pots, designs and passing off

Leave a Comment / Designs, Trade marks / / / , , , , , , , , , ,

The Federal Court, Middleton J, has rejected Bodum’s allegations that

  1. the sale of the Baccarat Venice coffee plunger and Euroline’s Classic coffee plunger passed off Bodum’s Chambord coffee plunger or was otherwise misleading or deceptive; or
  2. Baccarat’s Devon teapot passed off Bodum’s Assam Tea Press or was otherwise misleading or deceptive.

Playcorp Group of Companies Pty Ltd v Peter Bodum A/S [2010] FCA 23

The judgment includes depictions of the products and their packaging in the appendices.

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Adwords and Keywords

Leave a Comment / Trade marks / / / , , , ,

Prof. Gans over at CoreEcon takes issue with Eric Clemons’ paper in which Prof. Clemons appears to be arguing that Google’s business model – using sponsored links and paid advertising triggered by keywords and the like – is based on misdirection.

Now, if Prof. Clemons were right, that could be a reason for contending that the use of trade marks in keywords etc. is (at least) misleading or deceptive conduct. But, as noted, Prof. Gans puts a very big question mark over this.

Now, neither of the Professors is dealing with the legal arguments, but I do wonder why people would click on (keep clicking on) Google’s sponsored links on the scale which they apparently do if the sponsored links etc. were in fact misdirecting them.

Whatever happened to the case which the ACCC brought against Google here? 

IPKat overlooks the work in progress in the EU here.

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