“You made Wikipedia!”

Thanks to Eric Goldman for telling me “You made Wikipedia!”. Here is the link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initial_Interest_Confusion.

Even without the citation, the entry is a very good overview of the Initial Interest Confusion Doctrine. (Some of you will recall that I ranted about this doctrine some time ago; others of you could care less).

Falling into the category of “what goes around…”, I found myself writing a cease and desist letter recently in which I told the defendant that his use of my client’s trademark on the defendant’s website fell right smack into the Initial Interest Confusion Doctrine. And for the first time, I liked that doctrine and appreciated the fine legal minds that conjured it up.

Jonathan Pink is an intellectual property attorney specializing in copyright, trademark and patent litigation.  He is resident in the Irvine (Orange County) office of Bryan Cave, LLP.