🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <19921102.005@erik.naggum.no> enag@ifi.uio.no (Erik Naggum) writes:
>I feel compelled to rectify this:
>
>Second, what you probably confuse this issue with, is Sun Microsystems,
>Inc, and their "yellow pages" (YP) distributed database which threatened
>the trademark belonging to _British_ Telecom, the _U.K._ phone company.
>It seems that Bwitish trademark law is such that they have a flat
>namespace, which enabled/forced BT to sue SMI.  SMI was forced to name
>it "NIS" as a result of this suit.

I feel compelled to rectify this:

British trademark law does _not_ have a flat namespace; but BT YP and Sun YP
were members of a small common subset of the namespace, i.e. "directories".
(Think: why did Sun call it YP? Could it have been an analogy?)  Since you 
can get the BT YP on CD-ROM (at a large price), with custom search software,
there was scope for confusion when Sun were offering machines with YP built-
in.  Vertical market buyers may have thought they were getting bundled BT's 
product, or at least some other trade directory, for an incredibly cheap 
price. And of course eventually you will be able to get the Yellow Pages via 
X.500. If BT hadn't stomped on Sun, some other PTT would have.