Legal Question in Intellectual Property in New York
A Company's logo is a trademark and usually has a specific word, font and color scheme as parts of the trademark. Google has such a trademark, typically seen on its homepage.
Google also displays variations of its trademark - alternate colors, fonts, styles, graphical tricks, etc. Of course, they can not violate their own trademark, but are they not diminishing/diluting its value by not using it in a consisent way? How could they defend an possible infringement when they themselves violate the trademark's integrity?
2 Answers from Attorneys
They don't violate the trademark's integrity (if it has any). They own the right to license the mark, make derivative works containing it and to alter it, should they choose.
Not all trademarks are for logos. You can have a trademark for the word as well; known as a wordmark. The word can appear in any typeface, etc and still retains its purpose if identifying goods and services with a particular source. Clearly, Google (R) is famous and it is clear to the public that all those forms you talk about identify it as the one and only, hence no confusion.
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