Wednesday, November 15, 2023

Nominative fair use: when a logo is not too much

It may well be true that nominative fair use often entails just using a word, not a logo, but courts occasionally recognize that there are situations where the logo/trade dress is actually an important means of communicating and should still fall within nominative fair use. In the wild, that's usually logos of social media sites, which regularly communicate "this is how to find me" and not "I am endorsed by." Here's an example from a competitor that was surely well advised:

Bing Webmaster tools screenshot showing Google search logo on left with invitation to import settings from Google


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