April - June 2006

TOP 10 NEW VIRUS THREATS

SEARCH ENGINE NEWS

Trademark Protection, Copyright and Search Engines

What do you do when someone is playing fast and loose with your intellectual property online? A panel of legal experts offer suggestions for a range of potential scenarios.
A special report from the Search Engine Strategies conference, March 27-April 2, 2006, New York, NY.

By now, most are familiar with the infamous Geico case, France's penchant for protecting brand names and the pending clickfraud case. Therefore, it was a pleasure, to hear views on meatier topics covered at the 2006 SES New York panel "Trademark Protection and Copyright." Led by Jeffrey Rohrs, President of Optiem, LLC (and a J.D. himself), the panel included David M. Adler, Esq of D.M.A. Esq. and Associates, Peter D. Raymond, Partner with Reed Smith and Deborah Wilcox, Partner with Barker and Hostetler.

The session began with agreement that technology and what humans are capable of doing with technology runs much faster than the law. It could be said that we are currently retrofitting offline copyright law to online media, and only when a case reaches critical mass will there be an opportunity to evolve the law.

Dealing with Trademark Infringement

The first practical application focused on the use of trademarks in pay-per-click ads, as evidenced by Mazda's keyword purchase of "Pontiac" shortly after Pontiac launched a television commercial urging viewers to Google "Pontiac." So while Yahoo! has recently ceased selling competitive trademarks, Raymond stated that comparative advertising is legal as long as it is truthful. Mazda's copy and landing page, for example, in no way misled consumers.

When it comes to copying online content, each use needs to be examined on a case-by-case basis. One must prove that harmful intent or that the second party is profiting off of said content. On this note, the panel acknowledged that many sites that scrape content from other sites are running Google Adsense, and that the owner is indeed profiting off of said content. The panel agreed that in most cases, people are reasonable and will remove content if the originator simply asks.

When prompted about altered or excerpted content, copyright laws exclude facts, so it is legal to post facts taken from another written account. Raymond brought up the fact that if a publisher did not want his content available in a search engine's index, he should simply use a robot.txt file to instruct search engine crawlers to avoid the content.

Another unique legal point was that publishers cannot be held liable for damages. Both Wilcox and Adler stressed that to take legal action against an infringer, it is critical to have federal copyright registration, and that a serialized copyright certification is only about $30.

Modifying Press Releases: Going Too Far?

Most folks are aware that optimized press releases provide additional shelf life and reach. However, what are the legalities of modifying press releases? Having stated that it is legal to republish facts, and asserting that it is the press' responsibility to turn releases into stories, where does one draw the line?

The case in point was the modification of a hyperlink in a press release being modified to the competitor's site, effectively altering the meaning and intent behind the release. Wilcox and Raymond disagreed on whether such alteration would be actionable in court, but ultimately agreed that actual damages would be hard to estimate. A few audience members, on the other hand, vehemently disagreed.

The final, unanswered question is whether links will be considered copyrightable in the future. On a more depressing note, it was suggested that our current judges and law clerks are not sophisticated enough to understand the granularity of such a case.

Along the lines of copying content was the topic of outright pirating of an entire site. Rohrs suggested that website owners monitor new content on the web by setting a Google or Yahoo! alert for particular copy. To gather evidence, Adler advised firms to print off copies of the offending site, but reminded that hosts cannot be held liable. Once again, most people are reasonable and will take down pirated content if prompted by a cease and desist.

Helpful Resources
Mr. Rohrs was kind enough to conclude with a list of helpful resources:

• U.S. Copyright Office - www.copyright.gov
• U.S. Patent & Trademark Office - www.uspto.gov
• Copyscape - www.copyscape.com
• Google Alerts - www.google.com/alerts
• Yahoo Alerts - http://alerts.yahoo.com
• Chilling Effect - www.chillingeffect.org
• Creative Commons - www.creativecommons.org
• AdGooRoo TM Monitor - www.adgooroo.com/tm

WEB DESIGN NEWS

After reviewing thousands of web sites over the years, I have come to the conclusion that many business web sites are missing the boat. For example, I've been working on some offline promotions and was searching for a simple targeted mailing list. I searched through about twenty sites and not one of those sites were, what I would consider, professional. Their standard blue links were enlarged to about a size 16 font, busy backgrounds, flashing images and very unorganized. Did I purchase a mailing list from any of those sites? Absolutely not. Why? The way I see it, if those companies don't take pride in their web sites, chances are, they won't take pride in their products either. Large linked text and flashing graphics won't make sales.

Your web site is a direct reflection of you and your business. The appearance of your site is the most important factor in determining your sites value. In other words, if your site doesn't look professional or pleasing to the eyes at first glance, its perceived value and the value of your products and services will be low.

On the other hand, you may have a great web site, well designed and a quality product or service, but if it takes too long to load, the value will still be perceived as low. Why? Because your potential customer won't wait. Ultimately costing you business.

Another consideration of great importance is your content. Not just links, but content with value. When someone is surfing the net and they visit your web site, they're visiting for a reason. Your site has something they want. Whether it is your product, service or information, that's why they're there. If they don't find what they're looking for, they'll move on to the next site and so on. If you want your visitors to stay at your site, provide the quality content they're looking for in a nicely organized fashion. Give them a reason to want to explore your site and to continue to visit your site in the future.

After receiving many questions in regard to website design, I have devised a list of, what I refer to as, "35 Deadly Web Site Sins."

• Poor load time
• Poor overall appearance
• Spelling/Grammar
• No contact information
• Poor content
• Poor navigation
• Broken links and graphics
• Poor browser compatibility
• Large slow loading graphics
• Too many graphics
• Pages scrolling to oblivion
• Multiple use of animated graphics
• Animated bullets
• Too many graphic and/or line dividers
• Busy, distracting backgrounds
• Multiple banners and buttons
• Poor use of frames
• Large fonts
• Pop up messages
• Over use of java
• Poor use of tables
• Poor organization
• Different backgrounds on each page
• Over powering music set to autoplay
• Confusing
• Too much advertising
• Large Welcome banners
• Multiple colored text
• Text difficult to read
• No Meta tags
• Multiple use of different fonts
• Under construction signs
• Scrolling text in the status bar
• Large scrolling text across the page
• Poor use of mouse over effects

Take some time to really look at your site. Compare it to sites that you feel look professional. Time your site's load time -- your customers won't wait. Their time is valuable. The simple, well designed sites make the sales. If your sales aren't what you had hoped, take some time to seriously evaluate your site and make some changes before spending your time and money on advertising and marketing. You may be pleasantly surprised.

Copyright © Shelley Lowery
About the Author:

Shelley Lowery is the author of the acclaimed web design course, Web Design Mastery. http://www.webdesignmastery.com And, Ebook Starter - Give Your Ebooks the look and feel of a REAL book. http://www.ebookstarter.com Visit Web-Source.net to sign up for a complimentary subscription to Etips and receive a copy of the acclaimed ebook, "Killer Internet Marketing Strategies." http://www.web-source.net