Utah’s legislature is currently pushing through another bill to limit abusive practices of using a competitor’s trademark in paid keyword search advertising. The bill (HB 450) is intended to prevent bad faith diversion of web traffic from a competitor using the competitor’s own trademark. In other words, it is intended to prevent businesses from using a competitor’s goodwill (as represented in the competitor’s trademark) against the competitor. Bad faith diversion can increase the bad faith diverter’s web presence using its competitor’s tradmark and goodwill to the detriment of the actual trademark owner; bad faith diversion can dilute the tradmark owner’s web presence and SEO strength. Substantial money is being spent by large search engine companies, such as Google and eBay to stop the bill from becoming law. HB 450 has had a few trip-ups, but appears to be moving forward. I will have more to say on this after the Utah Legislature takes its final vote on HB 450. You can follow the history and status of HB 450 at the following Utah Legislature link.
http://le.utah.gov/~2009/htmdoc/hbillhtm/HB0450.htm