[Wikipedia-l] Genericized trademarks (was Re: wikipedia in China)

[Stirling Newberry]

On Sep 25, 2004, at 1:28 AM, Michael Snow wrote:

> Jens Ropers wrote:
>
>> If it acts like napalm but just happens to contain ''slightly''   
>> different chemicals, ''plus added oxidisers'', then of course it's   
>> ''totally irresponsible'' to call the substance napalm.
>> Jayzuz, that would be like--like calling a land rover a jeep! Or   
>> calling a whirlpool a jacuzzi!! Or--gasp--calling photocopying   
>> xeroxing!!! How TOTALLY inaccurate!!!!
>> </irony>
>
> Actually, from the perspective of the owners of those respective  
> trademarks (Jeep, Jacuzzi, and Xerox) it would be totally inaccurate  
> and irresponsible. You may not personally care about such things, but  
> they would go to a great deal of effort to discourage people from  
> using those terms incorrectly.
>
> Wittingly or not, the elements of your analogy have a significant  
> point in common, which is that these are all trademarks in danger of  
> genericide (fortunately, a much less violent demise than those you  
> have been arguing about). Interestingly enough, I discovered that our  
> article on napalm states that it too is a trademark, belonging in this  
> case to Dow Chemical. However, my initial research was unable to  
> verify this claim. Does anybody have a source that could back this up?  
> I rather wonder whether napalm as a trademark might already have gone  
> generic, given how many people use it to mean any gasoline-based  
> military incendiary device, as shown by this discussion.
>
> Instead of flaming each other from divergent points of view, perhaps  
> we could redirect our focus to getting facts correct in our articles.
>
> --Michael Snow
>
> ______________________

http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield? 
f=toc&state=vg813n.1.1&p_search=searchss&p_L=50&BackReference=&p_plural= 
yes&p_s_PARA1=&p_tagrepl%7E%3A=PARA1%24LD&expr=PARA1+AND+PARA2&p_s_PARA2 
=Napalm&p_tagrepl%7E%3A=PARA2%24COMB&p_op_ALL=AND&a_default=search&a_sea 
rch=Submit+Query&a_search=Submit+Query

Urban legend (currently in some wiki articles) Napalm is not a  
trademark. Napalm-B was used in Vietnam, and the word is now "a generic  
term for jellied gasoline". That is gasoline stablized by use of  
plastics.

And genericide isn't a crime, the accepted definition removes trademark  
status when a word enters common use. Companies discourage use of  
trademarked words as regular words, not because it is against the law,  
but because it is not against the law.