When can you use a trademark of somebody else in a domain name and when as an advertising tool in the form of AdWords? This recurring question came up in recent preliminary relief proceedings. AdWords are ’search words’ that you can buy from Google. After typing in these words your website will be displayed in the sponsored links next to the generic (normal) search results. If this search word is a trademark of somebody else, this may constitute an infringement of that trademark right. …read more

Court of The Hague, 11 February 2009, Wegener ICT Media B.V./Innoweb B.V.

After the Court had ruled in preliminary relief proceedings at the end of 2007 that the search engine Gaspedaal.nl could search and partly copy the used car offers of Autotrack.nl (and other car sites) Newsletter January 2008, the Court has now ruled in proceedings on the merits that this is no longer allowed. …read more