Apple sued over use of ‘iBooks’ name

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Apple sued over use of ‘iBooks’ name

Apple has been sued in federal court by publisher John T. Colby, which is claiming trademark infringement over the use of the term “iBooks.” Bloomberg reports that Colby purchased the assets of various entities owned by New York publisher Byron Preiss, who had published more than 1,000 books under the “ibooks” name, beginning in 1999. Apple has a trademark on the term “IBOOK” as it relates to computers and once sold a laptop called the iBook, which was replaced by the MacBook when the company switched to Intel processors. The lawsuit argues that Apple never used the term as a designation for electronic books or an application for the delivery of electronic books until it launched the iPad. “Apple’s use of the mark ‘iBooks’ to denote the electronic library that can be accessed via its iPad tablet computer and its iPhone is likely to overwhelm the good will of plaintiffs’ ‘ibooks’ and ‘ipicturebooks’ marks and render them virtually worthless,” the lawsuit says.

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Comments

1

I would guess that 99% of people who read this article have never heard of Mr. Colby, Mr. Preiss or any of the “ibooks” that have been produced. If anything, the infringement (and even the lawsuit) give ibooks more atttention. Under the assumption that “all press is good press”, it is much more likely that Apple’s iBooks has grown the value of “ibooks”.

Posted by Dave on June 16, 2011 at 10:43 AM (PST)

2

Preiss’s Ibooks, Inc filed chapter 7 backruptcy (liquidation) in 2006 after his death. Colby acquired (bought) the rights in 2006. He’ll probably end up with something in the sue me sue you blues.

BTW, iJust filed copyrights for every word on the planet using “i” in front. iThought you might want to know. iWill sue anyone using these iWords from now on.

Posted by drakebullet on June 16, 2011 at 4:29 PM (PST)

3

If this douchebag had a problem with Apple using “iBooks” as a moniker, then he should have raised his voice back when it was first introduced, NOT NOW. Now is too late. Any judge with any brains would throw this case out in favor of Apple.

Posted by Jeff Stockmann on June 18, 2011 at 9:02 PM (PST)

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