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Wednesday, 31 July 2013 15:42

Zynga takes the "litigate over innovate" path; sues the makers of “bang with friends”

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Yesterday we talked about how the social network gaming company Zynga was having a rough time of things. Now we are hearing that they could be pulling off a desperation move by suing another company over trademark infringement. The culprit here is the developer behind the adult app Bang with Friends (who has the same name as the app). Now, while we could see Zynga getting a little upset over the title for a few reasons not the least of which is associating this title with their kid friendly games that have the same naming scheme. However to try and claim trademark infringement because of the “with friends” part is a little much.

 

The complaint argues that Bang with Friends used the title hoping to use the popularity of Zynga’s own games saying that they “selected the name ‘Bang With Friends’ for its casual sex matchmaking app with Zynga’s game trademarks fully in mind,”. Now I am not sure about you, but I think the market is a tad different for the two groups of apps and people are not likely to be confused as to who is behind these app. The again if Apple can claim that people were confused about what tablet they were buying from stores like Best Buy (when they require a certain distance between their products and others) and win then this is as likely to fly as anything.

Zynga is looking to bar the sale of this app as long as it uses this name and also… you guessed it; unspecified damages. This last part of the suit makes it seem much more likely that Zynga is looking to recover some lost funds through the courts rather than actually create a new and compelling game. This is a very dangerous move on their part and one that smells of desperation to be perfectly honest Companies like Apple, HTC and others have tried this and it never ends well. Right now HTC is hurting financially from their long fight with Apple and Apple is having their own problems after their long and ultimately unsuccessful campaign against Samsung and Android.

Unless this suit is open and shut on the evidence Zynga could be tossing cash and their reputation in the toilet and providing a boost for the app they want to grab a quick buck from.

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Read 2441 times Last modified on Wednesday, 31 July 2013 15:45
Sean Kalinich

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