Monday, March 2, 2009

The True Meaning of ‘netbook’

After browsing Slashdot today, I ran across this article http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/03/02/1135208. This article points out how a company called Psion had the term ‘netbook’ trademarked in the late ‘90s. Though it seems with the popularity of netbooks (internet notebook computers) thanks to companies like Intel and ASUS, Psion would like to cash in on this now.

After visiting Save the Netbooks, I’ve realized that it seemed the Psion left their trademark dormant  with their discontinued NetBook line. It was until recently that they ‘started’ to sell these NetBooks according to Psion at least. I browsed their website (http://www.psionteklogix.com/) and I could only find these NetBooks on their discontinued products section of the website.

Intel, Dell, HP, ASUS, and other companies didn’t coin the term netbook, but instead tried to market notebooks that were only for the sole use of the internet and email. As it stands, it seems that the term netbook is generic and should be that way as it describes a group of specific notebook computers.

If one even goes to Wikipedia definition of Netbook, one will see what makes a netbook a netbook. As you can see, consumers adopted the term ‘netbook’ as a generic term. Hopeful the courts will see this and Psion will be forced to relinquish their trademark on this because it is obvious that the term netbook is already known by the masses out in the world.

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