Switched has a new home! Huffpost Tech.

Click here to visit the new home of Switched!

Hot on HuffPost Tech:

See More Stories
AOL Tech

Russian Businessman Trademarks ;-) Emoticon

by Terrence O'Brien on December 12, 2008 at 05:01 PM

Ridiculous Russian Businessman Trademarks ;-)
We really love it when people make outrageous claims that they, for example, own the trademark for an emoticon.

Oleg Teterin, a Russian businessman and owner of Superfone (a mobile ad company), has trademarked the wink emoticon, ;-). Teterin says he has no intentions of going after individual users, but that he wants businesses to understand they will not get away with using his trademarked symbol without paying a small licensing fee -- just a few tens of thousands of dollars a year. Teterin even had the gall to claim that the emoticons :-), ;), and :) are similar enough to his newly-trademarked wink that they will also be subject to legal action.

Of course, Teterin is ignoring the widely accepted tale that the emoticon was invented by Scott Fahlman, a Carnegie Mellon professor, who included :-) in an e-mail way back in 1982. We expect that Teterin's claim will crumble as soon as he actually tries to enforce his trademark in front of a judge. [From: SF Gate]

Tags: emoticons, humor, lawsuits, russia, trademark, weird

Comments

4

HuffPost AOL Social News Most Popular