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This is a notice for all bloggers. We are asking that you do not read or link Politico from this point forward. They have violated the cooperative spirit of the Blogosphere.

This boycott will continue until they drop their ridiculous threats accusing College Politico of trademark infringement. Here are some details:

A collegiate blog is facing legal threat from Politico, generating blogger sympathy in a fight over its domain name.

In a Sept. 16 letter to Stephen Gutowski, operator of thecollegepolitico.com, the company has claimed trademark infringement. The cease-and-desist demand, says Gutowski, calls for all use of his site to be relinquished to Capitol News Company LLC, publishers of Politico, within 10 days. Capitol News representatives, Dow Lohnes PLLC, contend his site and its contents are “confusingly similar” to their trademarks.

The origins of the word, “politico,” date to 1630, and signify a person active in party politics, according to Princeton’s WordNet.

Politico via counsel has issued similar cease and desist letters. In December 2007, the company forced the hand of an electronic trade publication aimed at political marketing to Hispanics. In a letter to readers, publisher Arturo Villar said the publication “reluctantly” changed their name from La Política to CandidatoUSA. Capitol News also holds the rights to Campus Politico, Wall Street Politico, Hollywood Politico, Mobilepolitico, El Policito and Politico TV.

“From a legal standpoint, [Politico] probably has a reasonable claim,” said Robert Cox, president of Media Bloggers Association. “The issue is whether people are likely to be confused.”

“It’s not even a close call,” said Jerald Fritz, Politico’s general counsel. “Brand and names are essential for any venture … we’re aimed at protecting our mark.” Fritz referred to Ford Mustang, Apple Computers and Greyhound as trademarks supportive of Politico’s claim. “There are countless examples. You can go on and on,” he said.

Ron Coleman, a commercial litigator and trademark lawyer at New York and New Jersey’s Goetz Fitzpatrick LLP., has targeted weak points in Politico’s argument on his blog, Likelihood of Confusion. Notably, said Coleman, generic words do not enjoy trademark protection, while descriptive words may only become trademarks if they have acquired distinctiveness.

“Politico’s problem is that although it may indeed be able prove that ‘POLITICO’ has acquired distinctiveness for online journals, it is still a rather weak trademark because of its descriptiveness,’ he said.

For example, search engine optimization gurus and sploggers (spam blogs) often utilize hyphens to trigger keywords in URLs that may create this kind of confusion. Helpful to Gutowski’s defense may be the lack of hyphenation in the address of thecollegepolitico.com. A Go Daddy query for “the-college-politico.com” (which also happens to be available for purchase) would yield far more results associated to Capital News’ trademarked Politico.com than his hyphen-less address.

If the trend continues, multiple sites, including politico.blogspot.com, mondopolitico.com and sandiegopolitico.com, may face legal battles over use of the word “politico” in their domain name.

In a live by links, die by links New Media world, some bloggers have even called for a ban on linking to Politico. “The blogosphere has been very good to Politico, and I think they should bear in mind the ill will they’re incurring as a result of their heavy-handed legal tactics,” said Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds in a recent post. “Until this threat is withdrawn, I plan to boycott Politico, and I encourage others to do the same,” stated a post at Patterico’s Pontifications.

The College Politico has been credited with breaking several stories and picked up by The Washington Post, USA Today and The Huffington Post. His coverage exposed Lyndon LaRouche supporters were behind “Obama=Hitler” signs.

“I certainly didn’t create [thecollegepolitico.com] with any odd intention of somehow tricking people into thinking I was affiliated with Politico,” said Gutowski, who has drawn support from a host of bloggers. “This seems like an ugly attempt to intimidate me into handing over a brand which I’ve worked extremely hard to build.”

“Politico has offering no compensation in the demand, and has asked that Gutowski, a recent graduate of Pennsylvania’s Messiah College, write the company a letter declaring he will permanently cease and refrain from all future use of “The College Politico” or anything similar to “politico.”

The current conflict echoes a two-and-a-half year battle between Microsoft and Lindows.com, Inc., in which Microsoft accused its competitor of trademark infringement. Lindows maintained the term “windows” was generic, and Microsoft agreed to pay $20 million in exchange for the Lindows name and a clutch of websites.

There are other nouns enjoying widespread implementation in the Blogosphere, such as pundit. Glenn Reynolds was likely the first to use it, but he isn’t suing all the others who admired him and piggy-backed on his idea — Gateway Pundit, PoliPundit, and Daily Pundit, who named the Blogosphere.

Patterico’s Pontifications — Politico to College Politico: Give Us Your Domain or We Will Sue You

Spread the word far and wide: we will not stand for such thuggish tactics. ….Until this threat is withdrawn, I plan to boycott Politico, and I encourage others to do the same.

Riehl World View — Politico: All Your Politicos Belong To Us!

Well, it was a nice word while it lasted, dating back to 1630. Now it seems the growing power of New Media has convinced Politico that they get to own a noun!! Man, wouldn’t I love to have me one of those.

Hot Air — Who owns the word “politico”?

It’s no surprise that the word gets exercised in the blogosphere, and also no surprise that a journalistic enterprise would want to use it for their somewhat unconventional approach to political coverage. But does that mean that they’re the only ones who can use that word?

Boycotting Politico so far:Stop the ACLU

POWIP | Piece of Work In Progress

Patterico’s Pontifications