Intellectual Property Law
Judge refuses to toss infringement lawsuit against Facebook over its timeline feature
A federal judge in Chicago has refused to dismiss a lawsuit claiming that Facebook infringed another company’s trademarks with its timeline feature.
U.S. District Judge John Darrah ruled that Facebook failed to prove the trademarks were generic, report IDG News Service, Bloomberg News and Mashable.
Timelines Inc. filed the suit against Facebook in 2011. Timelines had started a website in 2009 that lets users create timelines for historical events. It has federal trademark registration numbers for “Timelines,” “Timelines.com” and for its “Timelines” design mark, according to court papers cited by IDG News Service.
Facebook’s timeline feature allows users to organize their personal history in chronological order.
