SCOTUS to hear Booking.com arguments over teleconference
The US Supreme Court is set to hear a series of oral arguments by telephone conference next month, including a dispute over ‘generic’ domains.
The announcement marks the latest way the COVID-19 pandemic is forcing courts across the world to use technology in order to maintain some continuity while citizens are locked down.
All nine justices will use teleconferencing from May 4 to May 12 in a limited number of previously postponed cases.
“In keeping with public health guidance in response to COVID-19, the justices and counsel will all participate remotely. The court anticipates providing a live audio feed of these arguments to news media,” said the announcement.
The court had previously postponed its original March and April oral argument sessions amid the pandemic.
US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) v Booking.com
A trademark dispute between the USPTO and flight and hotel search engine Booking.com will be one of the ten cases heard by the US’ highest court next month.
The USPTO has asked the Supreme Court to reverse a decision of the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, which concluded that such trademarks are protectable “where evidence demonstrates that the mark’s primary significance to the public as a whole is the source, not the product”.
While the USPTO has argued that adding generic top-level domains, such as .com, to “generic” terms such as “booking”, cannot result in a protectable trademark, Booking.com contends that terms such as ‘booking’ are better characterised as descriptive terms which, with the suffix .com, have acquired distinctiveness through use.
However, one major case left off the arguments roster is the decade-long clash between Google and computer software company Oracle.
In November 2019, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Google’s case. Earlier this year, Google urged the court to reverse the landmark ruling, which held that key elements of the Android mobile operating system breach the copyright for the Java programming code.
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