Too late (more profound than just being in M-W, it's made the OED as lower-case 'google') or should the Law just use a bit more common-sense if a dispute arises?
Either way, google/Google should be very happy that people use it in everyday terminology now. I get people coming into work that have never used a computer before, but they know what Google is.
I guess their "Don't Be Evil" mission statement said nothing about "Don't Be Stupid". Next Microsoft will be sueing double glazing companies... I can't remember Hoover ever having a problem.
Indeed, if people only google, and do not search, then the first place they're going to think of when they want to google is Google.
The brand identity is all good, for now. In the near future, however, if the name becomes too commonplace it will lose its identity with the search engine and become just another term for searching, regardless of the engine used. The degradation of brand name into the vernacular is an important topic covered in any good Advertising class. Two cases that immediately come to mind are Xerox and Kleenex. The two names became so synonomous with their respective product, that the terms became commonplace. People started "Xeroxing" forms and asking for a "Kleenex" to blow their noses, even though they were using Canon photocopy machines and Puffs brand tissues. Another example can be seen in the US, predominantly the South. "Coke" is often used to describe any soda, regardless of brand. I agree that they're a bit too late here as the term has already become vernacular (as evidenced by its admission to M-W and OED). Though I can understand Google's concern, from a marketing standpoint. -monkey
Yes, but have Xerox, Kleenex, Coke, FedEx or Hoover actually suffered from this? I don't think so. If anything, this vernacularisation of their their brand names has elevated them to an iconic status. Just like the icons on your desktop (particularly if you have an Apple Mac) are sort of achetypical representations, so have their brand names become archetypical descriptions of the generic product or act. "It's the real thing" (sic).
Well, I can't say whether or not the brand has suffered, at least not without a pile of market data. But the theory behind the degradation of the brand name is that the brand name loses its attachment to the actual brand, and becomes just another name for that particular product. So, when the teacher asks each student to bring in a box of Kleenex, they don't all rush out and buy Klennex brand tissues. Similarly, when a friend asks you to bring some Cokes to the picnic, and you show up with a variety of soda, Coca-Cola will not have retained the brand recognition it once had. -monkey
But surely people buying other stuff would have happened if the teacher had just said "tissues". Even if not, people will buy alternatives to Kleenex because they're cheaper, available in a more convenient place, or better. Google is available everywhere, is free, and is the best search site. It's name has nothing to do with this, the fact that it's free, light weight, and the best search site is what makes people visit. Google of all people should understand that.
True, alternatives do exist. But the point is that when the teacher says the word "Kleenex," the people don't think, "Oh, a Kleenex brand tissue." they think, "Oh, a tissue, let's see what's on sale." Kleenex loses the attachment of the product to the name, and the name becomes just another synonym for the product. In Google's case, the brand name is still relatively new, and still maintains its attachment to the company. I think Google are worried that in the near future, "google" will just be another term for "search." Hence, the teacher tells a student to "go google (insert fac)" and the student opens up Yahoo!. Branding is a delicate art. You have to instill the brand in the people's minds without making the brand name so commonplace that it becomes just another synonym. -monkey
I can't see that a brand becoming a generic name hurts sales by brand degradation per se, in Coca-Cola's case they were able to build a campaign round "It's the real thing". The worry to firms is that a rival can deliberately mislead punters by advertising something that's not the real thing. "Hoovers from £25", and then claim in defence "It's just another word for a vacuum cleaner". How that could hurt Google I'm not sure, "Do your googling with Yahoo"?
A little off topic, but Coca Cola still defend that name quite seriously. They actually have teams of people who go to resteraunts and bars and ask for "Coca Cola", if they're given generic coke or Pepsi they generally sue the place. All quite serious to them.
Now THAT'S freakin evil! It bothers me that in this day and age so many companies have come to substitute branding for actually making good products. You're supposed to buy product X not because it's better, or faster, or a better value, but because it's made by company Y. Never mind that product X is exactly the same as products A, B and C, all of which were made in the same factory in China and just shipped as different brands. Case in point (I'm going to be late for work if I keep this rant up): toilet paper. A decent sized chunk of the toilet paper in the US is made here in Bellingham at the GP tissue plant. You watch them haul it down the street from the mill to the warehouse and look at the boxes in the back of the truck and they are marked with 4 or 5 different brands, yet you know that they all just came off the same machine. There is NO DIFFERENCE between these products, yet one costs more because it's a "trusted brand" and people buy it!!!!
Indeed, the power of marketing. It's interesting, then, that in times of recession one of the first groups to suffer cuts is the advertising department. Just like Cthippo's toilet paper example, a lot of the "generic" store brand product you see is just repackaged product from the leading brand name. Kroger (a grocery store chain in the U.S.), for example, will buy cereal from Post and General Mills and package it in clear, plastic bags. Some people assume only the poor would buy such cheap, generic cereal. Their kids only get the good, boxed stuff with the cartoon character on the front. -monkey
Not entirely. If you tell someone to buy Kleenex, chances are that they'll come back with the cheapest tissues that do the job (I know my family almost always buys Scotties brand facial tissue, despite writing Kleenex on the grocery list). Likewise, most people looking to buy a "Xerox machine" are looking for any ol' copier, and will get whatever's cheapest that fills their needs. Maybe that will be a Xerox brand copier, but more often than not, it won't be. Now for the moment, it's working great for iPods and Google - they clearly dominate their market. But look at Walkman. The only reason that 'iPod' isn't entirely the generic name for portable MP3 player, as Walkman was for cassettes, is that plenty of other options are out there, and some have more or better features (with cassettes, it's pretty much the standard five-button affair, the only difference between players being maybe battery life and color). However, at least in my school, it's become "put away your iPods", not long after "put away your Walkmans", even though MP3, casette, CD, or the more-generic portalble audio players would have sufficed, and been more accurate to boot. So, long story short, it's usually great in the short term, but once there are competing products (let's face it - Google really has no major competition, even if there are plenty of alternatives), the cheapest wins. Or, more likely in the case of search engines, the one with the best results and features wins. It's quite a different thing with free products - at least Kleenex, iPod, Xerox, Coke, and whatever have something a bit more tangible to compete on.
You know, I dont know if that many people use it but where I live alot of the older folk call all digital recording devices, Tivo's. Even if its from the cable company. I could definetly see how having a name that is used for everything can divert sales to products other than there original intent.
That's sort of missing my point. Sure, people may be motivated to buy the cheapest product, but they will do that regarding of whether they are called "tissues" or "Kleenex", a "copier" of a "Xerox machine". However, through the phenomenon of brand names turned into nouns/verbs, people will also receive the almost subliminal, implicit "knowledge" that if they want the best quality tissues, they want Kleenex; if they want the best quality copier, they want a Xerox; they want the classic, iconic brand product itself. Just by calling a personal cassette player a "Walkman" doesn't automatically imply it has the value or quality of one. It is just an easy descriptor. However if it has "Walkman" stamped across it, people know that this is (sic) "The Real Thing" ("accept no immitations"), not a cheaper copy. Every time someone uses the brand name to describe the generic product, it is a small advert saying: "this is really a cheaper immitation/approximation of the Real Thing". So if anything, using the brand name as a noun or verb has actually created a two-tier hierarchical category: there is the brand label product, and then there is the rest that aspires to be like the brand label product, but is actually a cheaper immitation. If we just talked about personal cassette players, you would simply have a Panasonic personal cassette player and a Phillips one and a Sony one. But by using the name Walkman, we implicitly and subconsciously make the distinction between the "real Walkman" and the rest of the (generic) personal casette players out there.
Fair enough. Though, as with everything else, there's the thoughts for the masses where you get the 'accept no substitutes' mentality, and then there's the educated consumers that are looking for any "iPod", box of "Kleenex" or "Xerox" machine that'll work best for them. Yes, for the masses, it's great. Not so much for, say, Bit-tech users talking about computer-related stuff, who tend to hunt around for the best item regardless of that brand recognition (though the iPod may well be an exception there). It's almost certainly a good thing for Google, despite what they think. I respect their desires for copyrighting or whatever, but most people are going to take "to google" literally, especially since they almost always give the best results with the least intrusiveness and the fastest.
Sony have actually lost control of the Walkman trademark in Austria so anyone there can use the term to describe their own product. Google haven't really done anything evil here, they're just "covering their ass" if the need to seriously defend their trademark arises. If they end up going to court while trying to sue someone and the judge asks "have you actually done anything to defend it?" and they can't produce copies of the letters they sent out, they'll have less of a leg to stand on. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/08/15/google_brand_abuse/
Control doesn't matter. Everyone knows which company makes the "it's the real thing" Walkman. Think of it as viral marketing. Every time someone says "Google it", they may be referring to generic search engines, but implicit to the choice of word is that Google is the search engine. By using the brand as a noun/verb, the brand product becomes an icon, an archetypical representation of the generic products. It becomes their Platonic ideal, so to speak.
