The Age had a report today about Spam-maker, Hormel Foods, taking action against other companies using the word “SPAM” as a trademark in their product names such as; SpamBop, Spam Arrest, and Spam Cube. They were unsucessful! It seems like Hormel want to save consumer having to answer a difficult question – “Which came first SPAM or Spam?”
EU trademark officials rejected Hormel Foods Corp’s appeal, dealing the company another setback in its struggle to prevent software companies from using the word “spam” in their products, a practice it argued was diluting its brand name.
The European Office of Trade Marks and Designs, noting that the vast majority of the hits yielded by a Google search for the word made no reference to the food, said that “the most evident meaning of the term SPAM for the consumers … will certainly be unsolicited, usually commercial email, rather than a designation for canned spicy ham.”
. . .
“We do not object to use of this slang term to describe (unsolicited commercial email),” the company said on its website, “although we do object to the use of the word “spam” as a trademark and to the use of our product image in association with that term.”
“Ultimately, we are trying to avoid the day when the consuming public asks, ‘Why would Hormel Foods name its product after junk email?'”
Some people would probably answer that there isn’t a great deal of difference – they are both as undesireable as each other! Not me I say bring on the SPAM-burgers!
