Court Denies Yahoo Request To Move American Airlines Suit

YahooAmerican Airlines' trademark infringement lawsuit against Yahoo will remain in the transportation company's backyard of Fort Worth, Texas, a federal district court judge there has ruled.

Yahoo had tried to move the lawsuit to California, but U.S. District Court Judge John McBryde rejected that request as "completely nonsensical."

American Airlines alleged last October that Yahoo and its subsidiary, Overture, unlawfully allow other companies to use American's trademarks, such as "American Airlines," to trigger paid search ads.

Yahoo contended that the case should be transferred to California because American is also a search marketer and agreed in its search contract to settle disputes in that state.

But McBryde was not persuaded. "The court finds that the clause does not pertain to claims made by American against Yahoo," he wrote in an opinion dated last Friday.

Yahoo has filed its own lawsuit against American Airlines in federal district court in California. The Web company argues that it's lawful to use trademarks to trigger search ads, and is seeking declaratory judgment against the airline.

American Airlines previously sued Google for trademark infringement in federal district court in Fort Worth. That case eventually was resolved with a confidential settlement after McBryde refused to dismiss it at a preliminary stage.

But Google has previously prevailed in several cases when companies have argued that their trademarks should not be used to trigger ads. In late 2004, Google won at trial in a lawsuit brought by insurance company Geico. There, federal district court judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, Va. found that Geico had not proven that consumers were confused when they typed "Geico" into the query box and paid search ads appeared for Geico rivals on the results page. (Google and Geico reached a settlement about another portion of the case.) Yahoo also was a defendant in that case, but Yahoo and Geico settled before trial.

Computer repair shop Rescuecom also lost a case against Google. In that instance, a trial judge ruled that arranging for a trademarked term to trigger a search ads is not a "use in commerce" under trademark law. The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals is currently considering Rescuecom's appeal.

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