Google finally sued by makers of Finally Fast
Google has been sued again by a company mad over the use of its trademarks as keywords, but this one comes with a twist.
Ascentive, the company behind those incessant "Finally Fast!" PC support ads, became the latest Google advertiser to sue the company for allowing advertisers to purchase ads using trademarks they do not own as search keywords. It will have to get in line behind Firepond, Rescuecom and several other companies challenging Google's policy, recently expanded to allow some companies to use trademarks they don't own in the text of their ads.
Ascentive takes its suit a step farther, however, also claiming that Google has unfairly removed some of Ascentive's Web sites from its search index. Ascentive's Finallyfast.com Web site and related software are designed to examine your computer for registry errors and spyware that are ostensibly slowing its performance, and the company has battled with StopBadware.org this year over whether its products should be considered a scam for its dire warnings about benign security threats on your computer that lead to an upsell pitch for Ascentive's services.
According to Ascentive, Google dropped it from search results following two warnings from StopBadware.org about its products. Still, even after StopBadware.org removed their warnings about Ascentive's products following some changes, a search for "finally fast" on Google does not return any Ascentive Web site. That search does, however, return a result for a company called "Finallyfast.us" which appears to offer a very similar product but does not appear to have any relationship with Ascentive.
Google declined to comment "on the individual reasons pages may be removed." Eric Goldman, a professor at Santa Clara University who tracks legal issues involving Internet law, doesn't think Ascentive's claims regarding the search results will get very far, according to his blog. "Indeed, as exciting as it would be to see some meaty discussion on the topic of Google's liability (or lack thereof) for deciding who gets into its search index, I'm guessing Google will beat this prong of the complaint quickly and completely," he wrote.
As far as the trademark part of the suit, Google had this to say:
"It's completely normal for a supermarket to stock different brands of cereal on the same shelf or for a magazine to run Ford ads opposite of an article about Toyota, so it doesn't make sense to limit competition online by restricting the number of choices available to users. Just as it's reasonable to expect a range of brands on any shelf in a grocery store, providing users on Google with more than one option when they search for a brand name or other trademark helps them to find the best product at the lowest price."
Tom Krazit writes about the ever-expanding world of Internet search, including Google, Yahoo, online advertising, and portals, as well as the evolution of mobile computing. He has written about traditional PC companies, chip manufacturers, and mobile computers, spending the last three years covering Apple. E-mail Tom. 
And as for a site not showing up in Google's index; last I check Google did not guarantee that every site would be listed and if a site was removed from the index for good reason it only makes sense that it would not be automatically put back in again. I am sure that if a request was sent to Google to review the site for inclusion in further indexing, that they would gladly comply.
From their site: Works with Windows Vista, XP, ME, 98, and 2000
Also, there is no reason that google would remove something without good reason, and therefore a simple request should put it back in order.
Finally, I'm pretty sure google has the right to display whatever it wants in terms of search results because they OWN the algorithm that creates them. (Correct me if I'm wrong)
This just confirms what I have been saying now for a long time these search providers control what we get when we do a search. It;s now like to general media when too controlling. I want to be able to search and not have the provider decide what I can or can not find. They can block things I want to find if that company does not pay to be listed. Not good.
You're free to do the same with Google or whoever doesn't provide the content you like. I happen to think Google does a pretty decent job for day to day searches for non-controversial topics. When it comes to important stuff, I have no problem going elsewhere.
But it's far different to start demanding that a company whose services you choose to make use of start providing you things on your terms. You're free to deal with them or walk away, but not dictate what they'll do with their servers and algorithms. Your wants are not entitlements, no matter what our generation has been raised by the schools, media, and politicians to believe.
Why don't you pay someone to provide you with what you want? Until then...quit whining about search providers controlling what you see. They do, and to me they have every right to do that unless they charge you for thozse search results.
This isn't an "enduser fairness" question, it's a question of how Google allocates it's paid services. To me, it's up to Google to provide it's results however it wants to. It's up to ME, though, to not be lazy and presume that the results I'm provided are the gospel. I should be informed as to what parameters a search engine uses to sort results.
That's not necessarily possible with Google, or with any search engine...so the push from endusers should be for some sort of transparency in this regard.
Are you for real?
Does Google offer paid search? If you advocate or promote your business as fear then why not just be that, is it so hard. If you are filtering out content they do not like or want us to see then they should make it clear they are doing so.
Just because it is free does not give them the right to pretend. I would happily pay a search provider who will not filter and just provide all the result to me so I can chose for my self. This is why I do not use only one search I use them all and not just sometimes but all the time.
Before you start defending google just they are not perfect, none of them are.
Another suit by someone who doesn't understand trademark law!
Like most things with Google, if you pay them enough money, you can get them to do whatever you want them to. It's a free market. Google isn't under any restrictions stating their results have to be fair or give qualified results- you can most certainly pay to get your listings higher in the ranking.
Remember, it's not a free service- ads support it. Google has no obligation to offer unbiased results. They are a for profit company.
They give our industry a bad name.
Go Google!
only an idiot would pay for removing spyware and etc
I'm sorry, commonly occurring two word and very short phrases like "finally fast" should just be SOL when it comes to rankings. If they want to be artificially higher in the list then they should pay for it or ****.
- by cgaliher July 4, 2009 4:31 PM PDT
- Google is in the wrong here. I have no love for "Finally Fast" but Google has crossed a line. Let's start by establishing a few facts. Read the first sentence in the second paragraph. Google is being sued for allowing advertisers to PURCHASE ADS with trademarked keywords. This isn't about pages getting indexed highly on their own, but about google actively breaking trademark laws to MAKE MONEY. And to prove my point, I'm going to use Google's analogy against them.
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(25 Comments)Google claims that you can go into a grocery store and be presented with variety. Okay, fine. Pepsico has spent time, effort, and money building the brand and trademark of Mountain Dew. Now you can walk into a Safeway and see on their shelf cases of Mountain Dew, and further down the aisle, you see "Green Lightning" which a common person could presume is a knock-off. Is Green Lightning infringing on Mtn Dew's trademarks? Depending on the design of their label, maybe, but for our argument we'll say they differentiated themselves enough not to. So no problems. At the same time though, Safeway isn't explicitly making money by helping a competitor ride Mtn Dew's coattails. Safeway and Google are the same in this respect. If Google *just* provided search results then all would be well.
Now let's say that Safeway starts an adertising business. Google sells ads, so this is where the comparison must be drawn. Safeway encourages "Green Lightning" to buy an ad, and safeway goes around all of their stores and puts small banners in front of Mountain Dew on the rack that says "Green Lightning tastes just like Mountain Dew and we sell it here!" Safeway is using a trademark name, Mtn Dew, to sell advertising of ANOTHER product! This is wrong! Google allowing competitors to PURCHASE ADS (yes, I stress it as I did above to draw the correlation) with another competitors trademarks in them as keywords, they are essentially allowing a practice that would never be allowed in the real world. They are allowing a competitor to stand on the backs and freeload off of a company that spends time and money building a brand.
Maybe "Finally Fast" does suck. But the product should rise and fall on its merit and free enterprise. Equally its competitors should rise and fall on THEIR merit...and free enterprise. But selling advertising based on one company's work to another isn't free enterprise at all.
So google, do no evil?!?