Does anyone have KNOWLEDGE of this? The builder in the community that I live in has trademarked 2 of the words in the name of the subdivison that I live in and specialize in. Their attorney contacted us recently and said that we may NOT use the "name of the subdivision" as a meta-tag to get google juice for our website. Our attorney quoted the following cases: See Playboy Enterprises, Inc. v. Welles, 279 F.3d 796 (9th Cir. App. 2002); See also Designer Skin, LLC v. S & L Vitamins, Inc. 560 F.Supp.2d 811 (D.Ariz.2008) (use of competitor's trademarks in metages upheld): New Kids on the Block v. News America Pub., Inc. 971 F.2d 302 (9th Cir. App. 1992) And our attorney stated the following: There is no practical way of describing the community without using the name of the subdivision (which describes a geographic place). And, in this regard it is extremely common for real estate agents/brokers to utilize trademarks (which describe a community) as metatags in their websites. And he further went on to explain that our website also contains a conspicuous disclaimer.
I only market & specialize in my community, I do not market or specialize in the city that this community is in, nor do I want to. If I search our community, their are many other Realtor's that are also using the community name as a meta-tag, and they are not going after anyone else. We have been very fortunate to sell more listings and represent more buyers in this communuty than any other Realtor and the builder is feeling that we are taking business away from them and that is why we feel they are going only after us.
This could hurt Real Estate and Realtor's all over the US, so please if you know of any other Realtors that this has happened to, please forward my post on to them, so that we can get some insight into an approach to take with this builder. Thanks so much.
Comments(2)