Lawyers vs Marketers

Would Band-Aid ever want people to start ask for "adhesive bandages"? How about pass the transparent tape, instead of Scotch tape? And the people at S. C. Johnson & Son, wouldn't they want customers covering their food in Saran Wrap, instead of plastic wrap? Well, according to two of the best regionizable brands they shouldn't.

The lawyers at both Google and Apple and trying to actually to prevent people from using the words that helped make them famous. Google's have now taken over the marketing department and is going to "crack down" on people using phrase as a verb such as "I'll Google it". The company reportedly stated that such phrases could potentially damage its brand?

Apple on the other hand, you think would be thrilled to have people call all mp3 players iPods, is reportedly attempting not only to monopolize the mp3 player market, but also the word "pod". Their legal team is trying to "protect" the iPod by sending threats to companies that use the word pod in their products.

Let's just hope Google won't be too upset when we start "yahooing for that recipe" and downloading those "MSRSS Casts" to our "Zune".