Search Marketers Declare War On Pork

Pork may be like mother's milk to some, but a very few of them would confuse the two because, in general, people understand metaphors. Lawyers don't. Lawyers don't get metaphors, even if they did really well on the analogies portion of their LSATs. Search marketer Jennifer Laycock suddenly finds herself trying to teach this subtle nuance of language to lawyers, and the entire SEM community is her assistant. We remember Jennifer for her numerous presentations at Search Engine Strategies conferences, and for the founding of the Lactivist project, a double-barreled approach, if you will, to teaching how to market websites on a budget while promoting the right to breastfeed in public. With her Pork Board's mark in light of your apparent attempt to promote the use of breastmilk beyond merely for infant consumption, such as with the following slogans on your website in close proximity to the slogan "The Other White Milk." "Dairy Diva," "Nursing, Nature's Own Breast Enhancement," "Eat at Mom's, fast-fresh-from the breast," and "My Milk is the Breast." Because clearly, this is not at all funny. The National Pork Board demanded Laycock stop displaying the slogan and destroy all merchandise displaying the slogan. The National Pork Board would be forced to seek a judgment for all profits made in connection with the sale of the tee shirt. All eight dollars of profit. "Are you freaking kidding me?" asks as puzzled Ms. Laycock about the "lawyer crafted nasty gram." "It's not like I'm selling a shirt that says 'Breastfed babies don't grow up to be porkers.' [. . .] "I understand that Trademark law requires that a company 'zealously' protect their trademark so that they can continue to hold on to it. Unfortunately, the ease of the Internet makes it really easy to fire off templated legalese emails at anyone and everyone that even comes CLOSE to the concept of the trademark. Big companies know that most bloggers have neither the time nor the resources to fight back, so even if the big company doesn't have a case, they win." The SEM community seems to agree. "I've heard breasts called many things but never have I heard them considered pork or pork products. Ditto breastmilk," says SEMigod Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl