Subway files a claim to trademark the word "footlong" and badgers small businesses currently using the term. On-ramp to the full-on debacle here, courtesy of an NPR blog.
Yes, as always, I'm late to the fracas, now raging since May 9th or so. Nonetheless, here's my opinion:
What grounds do they have to trademark something in such general use as "footlong" anyway?
Next we'll see trademarked:
Spicy
Hot and juicy
Cold (as in cold beer)
Good
For sale
What will be immune to trademarking if this goes through?
The issues of ownership, intellectual property, identity and brand are very engaging. I am no attorney, but it would seem to me that generic words could not be owned. I don't like it that any words are owned. I suppose I could see that a brand name concocted from a corporate punk's head might be okay if it were not in the OED or any other dictionary already...those words could be owned.
In fact, some like Polaroid, Xerox, and Kleenex have won battles in court for decades now. I agree with these guys, for the words did not exist prior to the inventions, ideas, etc. associated with the company that owned the trademarked term.
Leave it at that.
Subway, be a creative force instead of a monopolizing bully. Here, you marketing wizards, I'll give you some lingo to sling and trademark:
30.48 cm Sandwich
Eatcha IntoaComa Sandwich
SewerLog Sandwich
Want to keep that alliteration going? Five dollar Floater Sandwich
Friends don't let friends blog alone. Contribute your fresh ideas (oops, "fresh" is prolly a Subway owned word, too) in your replies.
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