Pinterest, the social networking site where users can “pin” items to various interest boards, has an estimated value of more than $11 billion. There is no doubt that its 70 million users identify the “Pin” and “Pin it” trademarks used on the site. But all of that notoriety and widespread use did not prevent it from losing two important trademark battles over exclusive right to use the word “pin” in connection with its various services.

Last week, the Northern District of California ruled that a start up company, Pintrips, may continue to use its “Pin” trademark in connection with its travel site. Pintrips allows users to “pin” an event or place into their travel itinerary. The decision was largely based on Pintrips’ allegations that when it adopted the trademark, it had not heard of Pinterest. The court went on to say that, “Pinterest cannot prohibit other companies from using the word pin to describe that well-known operation, which is exactly how the evidence demonstrates that Pintrips uses the word pin here.”

In the U.K. decision, at issue were two applications filed by start company, Free118, for “pinmydeal” used for flagging location-specific providers of promotions from businesses. Ultimately, the court determined the term “pin” was just too common to deny other applicants in the U.K. the right to incorporate it into their marks, noting that it is just as common as the words “my” and “deal.”

While Pinterest continues to fight to protect its Pin trademarks in other jurisdictions, these decisions may make it more difficult for Pinterest to keep others from encroaching into the “pin”-space and set a dangerous precedent that the Pin trademark could be consider generic. Pinterest also faces opposition by third parties in Germany, which is currently still being litigated.

Source: http://techcrunch.com/2015/10/26/pinterest-loses-pin-trademark-battles-in-us-and-uk/

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