They Don't Call It "Go Ogle" for Nothing …

The Second Circuit gives "Google for a search engine" as an example of "Arbitrary and fanciful marks—i.e., those that make no logical reference to the product or service on which they are used." Yeah, right.

Comments

[Jerry B.]

When you want to blow your nose, do you reach for a Kleenex, regardless of who actually made that tissue?

[Currentsitguy]

Band-Aid is another example that comes to mind.

[DaivdBehar]

The use of the brand name should be considered to be free advertising, and a benefit.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Or in the deep south, "Coke" for pretty much any soft drink.

[Dick King]

Coke was once descriptive, in the days when they had cocaine in the mix.

Coca-cola and Pepsico each obligate the restaurants who are their respective customers to correct a diner who asks for their competitor, so if you ask for a coke in a Pepsi restaurant, the waiter has to tell you that they only carry Pepsi.

-dk

[bernard11]

"No Coke. Pepsi."

[Currentsitguy]

Here in Western PA, generically speaking everything is "Pop", unless you specify a brand, as in "Yunz wanna can a pop n'at?"

Translation: "Would any of you like to have a can of a soft drink or something?"

[Brett Bellmore]

In my area of Michigan, it was actually "soda pop"; Apparently we were on the edge between a "soda" region and a "pop" region.

[Bored Lawyer]

Yes, there is a concept that a brand name can become generic. It's called genericide.
ASPRIN is the most famous example.

Doesn't mean that it was not originally arbitrary. Nor that GOOGLE has become generic.

[Bored Lawyer]

If you are looking for a quick laugh at what is (to most people) boring, see this video Velcro put out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRi8LptvFZY

[Bored Lawyer]

And here's their follow-up:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLWMQLMiTPk

[Soronel Haetir]

Aspirin becoming unprotected, as I understand it, was a matter of WW1 rather than a typical generalization process. I suspect if Germany had won that the various countries seizure of German company marks would have been reversed.

[Bored Lawyer]

Not exactly. The US did seize the German marks as enemy property. But that would only mean they would be auctioned off to the highest bidder.

The reason it became generic is because the consuming public viewed it as the name of a drug, not a source.
See Bayer Co. v. United Drug Co., 272 F. 505 (S.D.N.Y. 1921), an opinion by Learned Hand.
https://casetext.com/case/bayer-co-v-united-drug-co

[jdgalt1]

Some of these vary among countries. Aspirin is still a trademark in Canada; they want you to ask for an ASA instead.

[Bored Lawyer]

Prof. Volokh -- in what way do you think the 2d Cir is wrong? How is the word GOOGLE at all connected with internet searching? (Unless you contend it has become generic, as per the genericide doctrine, see my above comment.)

[Soronel Haetir]

The title says why it's not fanciful, related to the #1 use of the internet, i.e. sex.

[SRG]

That was accidental. The origin of "Google" is well documented.

[Bored Lawyer]

Today was the first time I heard of GO OGLE.

I always thought it was a takeoff on 'googol,' which is a mathematical term for 10 to the 100th power, or a 1 with 100 zeros after it.

[Brett Bellmore]

That's my understanding, too.

[Eugene Volokh]

Yes indeed. I was trying to make a little joke.

[santamonica811]

One would think that a Googol joke would be a very large joke, rather than a little joke.

[My favorite Googleplex factoid is (Assuming that Moore's Law is accurate and that computer speed does indeed double every X years or so): If you wanted to use a computer to print out all the zeros in one Googleplex, there would be no point in trying to do so for the next 500+ years, as whatever computer you would task with the project would be overtaken by later, faster, computers that were doing the same task. A Googleplex is such a massively large number that it's almost impossible to wrap our heads around.]

[Harvey Mosley]

"One would think that a Googol joke would be a very large joke, rather than a little joke."

Ding! Ding! Ding! You win today's internet!

[Bored Lawyer]

"My favorite Googleplex factoid"

How many are there that you have a favorite?

[santamonica811]

More than you'd think.

I recall a comic strip (pretty sure it was "Peanuts," but not 100%), that referenced Googol, at some point in my early childhood. First time I'd heard of the mathematical term. I vaguely recall Linus at the piano, talking to ____ (Lucy? Peppermint Patty???). She asked a question about Googol, and he replied, "No. No, no, no, no [... a total of 95 more repetitions.]" With the punchline, "If I've told you once, I've told you a hundred times."

Hilarity ensued.

[BadLib]

I thought I'd use the Google Search Engine (tm?) to find said "googol" strip...

Although it doesn't match yours, I did find this Peanuts strip from Jan 23, 1963 where Lucy asks 'HOW MUCH IS A "GOOGOL"' after Schroeder uses the term.

[Eugene Volokh]

Mine is 1/googolth of a joke.

[Bored Lawyer]

A nano-joke?

[Brett Bellmore]

10^100 , "Google" is only 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000.

Googleplex is 10^Google, 10^10^100. It's absurdly larger than just a google.

[santamonica811]

Yes. That was exactly my point, upthread. We humans really can't wrap our heads around just how much bigger Googolplex is . . . it's at a level that we just don't see in our lives or on Planet Earth, so we really can't give good analogies.

[EscherEnigma]

I've been using Google since it first came out, and this is the first time I heard that "go ogle" joke. The jokes I have heard are rooted in someone hearing that someone was being "googled" and assuming that was lewd, but the humor is that it's assumed to be lewd by someone who doesn't know the term, not that they misheard or some other wordplay.

[Eugene Volokh]

One of the few that I made up myself, though a Google search reveals (unsurprisingly) that others had come up with it as well.

[Doug Huffman]

It was a successful little joke. I had not thought to deconstruct the generic search engine name. GO*OGLE is great.

[jdgalt1]

I believe the name Google was intended to be read as meaning a very large number, as in a googol (10 to the 100th power).

Google's original corporate bylaws authorize the issuance of up to that many shares.

[John F. Carr]

Rumor has it Bing is better if you want to go ogle.