My experience responding to an Apple App Store Trademark Infringement Claim
I must say I certainly didn't see this one coming. Ravensburger AG submitted a Trademark infringement claim against my app Pocket Bombs to Apple. I recently received an email fom Apple Legal indicating that Ravensburger believes that my app infringes upon their REVERSI trademark. Apple's advice? Pull the app from the market place or respond with evidence proving that my app doesn't infringe.
The most interesting part is that nowhere in the email did it mention how I had infringed. It is kind of hard to resolve a problem when you don't know WHAT the problem is. :)
Updated on 16-OCT-2012
Not knowing the issue that Ravensburger has with my app, I compiled a polite reply and emailed it to the Representative from Apple Legal (who was nice enough to Carbon-Copy Ravensburger on her original email to me). After describing how Pocket bombs differs from REVERSI I was about to send it when I thought to do a quick google search to see if anyone had documented any similar experiences. I found a few interesting articles:
- Ravensburger Lowers Ban Hammer on Apple for Trademark Infringement - Developers Beware!
- Germany Gaming Company Ravensburger Abuses Trademark Law, Apple Folds
- Don’t lose your trademark
- Reversi is a trademark
I have no problem with a company owning and defending a Trademark. I do take issue with:
- The fact that Ravensburger AG didn't reach out to me directly about the problem -and-
- That Apple did not indicate to what / where the specific problem was.
Quoting from the email that Apple sent me:
We received a notice from Ravensburger AG ("Ravensburger") that Ravensburger believes your app (listed below) infringes Ravensburger's trademark rights to the term, REVERSI, in certain territories identified later in this email.
S. App Title: Pocket Bombs
Apple ID: xxxxxxxxx
-
To ensure that you are not infringing Ravensburger's rights, please either rename or remove your app from these territories; or provide us with confirmation and supporting evidence that your app does not infringe. You can reach Ravensburger by email (cc'ed on this message).
After reading this part of the email I was confused: Ravensburger does not hold a Trademark for Pocket Bombs, so how can Renaming or Removing my app possibly resolve any perceived Trademark infringement? After a little while I re-visited my Pocket Bombs page on the App Store. I could see that I mentioned 'Reversi' in the context of one of the Themes available for Pocket Bombs. It was a passing reference and was not a representation that the game is a Reversi clone (It couldn't be- I modeled it after an old game for the Newton Messagepad named 'Bomb Game').
While I believe that my use of the term 'Reversi' does not infringe upon Ravensburger's Trademark, I removed the term from my App's description page which will (hopefully) resolve the matter. The worst-case scenario is that I have to pull the app from Europe. Not the end of the world, but not really necessary either. I am still disappointed that the email does not mention WHERE they found they term to be infringement- what are legal processes turning into?
I'll keep this updated if anything interesting unfolds.
16-Oct-2012
I got a reply from Apple weeks later indicating that the change I made was acceptable. They've closed the issue.