Spoolies® — 'When elephants dance, the grass gets trampled'

The African proverb up top came instantly to mind when I received the following email last Thursday, October 25, 2007:

Trademark Infringement — Spoolies

Dear Book of Joe,

Please remove reference to "Spoolies" on your website in conjunction with Vermont Country Store.

Spoolies is a registered trademark name and is protected by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Vermont Country Store does not have a legal right to use the Spoolies name and they have removed reference to Spoolies on their website, catalog, and search engines.

Today when I typed Spoolies into Google, your subject heading came up referencing Spoolies to an old screen shot of a Vermont Country Store ad.

Please notify Google that you must remove this heading from your Book of Joe.

The official website for Spoolies hair curlers is www.spoolies.com

The website is under construction and the Spoolies hair curlers will be released early next year in the original rubber version not the PVC version that Vermont Country Store sells (now as hair spools).

Thank you for your help,

Jeanne James

....................

Let's all take a deep breath and see what the Spoolies kerfuffle is all about.

I featured the item in a post that appeared on September 14, 2006.

I guess the Spoolies people (Jeanne James et al) got their knickers in a twist as a result of the Vermont Country Store's apparently unauthorized use of the word, and did the usual lawyerbot cease-and-desist dance.

Now Ms. James is trying to put lightning back into the bottle and walk back the cat, after a fashion, by eliminating evidence of the Vermont Country Store's featuring the product using the Spoolies name.

And so they came to me.

If you put Spoolies into the Google search box you will get back about 10,000 results, with my September 14, 2006 post number 3.

Number 1?

The Vermont Country Store, where their "Hair Spools" appear when you click on the link.

So even though the Vermont Country Store has cleansed its site per the Spoolies lawyers, it still comes up on top when you search for Spoolies.

I suspect the same thing will happen if I go back and fiddle and diddle around with my post on the item.

And I haven't a clue how to get through the Google firewall and do what Ms. James would like me to do.

And besides, I'm a very, very busy and important person and I simply don't have the time to deal with stuff like this.

So I'm going to invoke the useful philosophy of Maxwell Maltz, to wit: "The best response is no response."

It usually does the trick in the OR and I see no reason why it shouldn't apply out here in the trademark space.

I'm also reminded of Henry Kissinger's wonderful observation, to wit: "The reason academic politics are so vicious is that the stakes are so small."