apples – Techdirt (original) (raw)

Apple Goes In Even Harder Against Prepear Over Non-Apple Logo

from the this-is-an-apple dept

A couple of weeks ago, we wrote about Apple opposing the trademark for Prepear, a recipe sharing phone app, over its pear logo. The whole thing was completely absurd. The logos don’t look anything alike, the color schemes and artistic styles are different, and also a pear is not an apple. I likened the whole thing to those absurd CNN commercials, which should give you some idea of just how dumb this whole thing was. So, thanks to this idiocy being exposed and the public backlash, Apple finally realized the error of its ways and backed off the opposition.

Just kidding. Apple, in fact, has decided to double down in opposing Prepear’s trademarks, now going after the Canadian trademark registration for the logo as well.

However, despite the petition now having hit 200,000 signatures, it doesn’t look like Apple is about to let this one go. As further evidence of Apple’s intransigence in this area, iPhone in Canada, which broke the original story earlier this month, is reporting that Apple has in fact doubled-down in its efforts to block the pear-shaped logo trademark registration, taking the fight beyond the U.S. and into Canada, likely as the next step in continuing its opposition to the logo globally.

Worth noting is that Prepear, the threat to Apple as it is, has five employees. That’s one less than it previously had, actually, since it had to lay off one staff member due to the ongoing legal fees to fight for its right to have a trademark that is a pear. To try to put public pressure on Apple to stop being the trademark bully, Prepear started an online petition to Apple to back off. After getting thousands of signatures to the petition, Prepear sent it to Apple’s PR wing and suggested that everyone get in a room and find an amicable way to end this stupid fight.

Apple’s PR group didn’t even bother to respond.

This is not just Apple’s lawyers being lawyers, it appears that the organization at Apple stands behind its lawyers. As is the case in all bullying, silence about the behavior of the bully is the same thing as support.

Now, Prepear could just go ahead and change its logo, though what type of pear-based logo Apple would find acceptable is an open question. And, besides, that should be entirely besides the point. Prepear is right to think it should be able to use a pear logo. It doesn’t look like Apple, isn’t going to create any confusion, and Apple is purely a bully here.

While Prepear expects that its fight with Apple will still cost tens of thousands of dollars before it can see it through to the end, it’s stated that it has no plans to do any kind of fundraising through services like GoFundMe, although they’re still asking for moral support via their Change.org petition, and of course still hoping more people will show their support by downloading and using their app.

How this will turn out is anyone’s guess. Prepear seems to want to fight, but Apple can almost certainly squeeze the company out in court until it dies if it really wants to. More public pressure might help, I suppose, but Apple has thus far seemed perfectly willing to ignore the will of the same public it claims to be defending from confusion.

This is how trademark bullying works and it’s a lesson being taught by a master at the art.

Filed Under: apples, canada, likelihood of confusion, pears, trademark
Companies: apple, prepear

DailyDirt: Better Tasting Fruits And Vegetables

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

If fruits and vegetables tasted even better, maybe people would include more in their diet. Part of what researchers at the U.S. Department of Agriculture are trying to do is to improve the taste and nutritional profile of specialty crops like fruits and vegetables, in the hope that Americans will adopt a healthier diet. For generations, humans have been inadvertently breeding the nutrients out of fruits and vegetables, by selecting varieties that are more palatable (i.e., higher in sugar and starch). Then, somewhere along the way, appearance became important, and farmers began breeding aesthetically pleasing varieties, often at the expense of taste. So, now we’re stuck with some pretty bland products. Here are some more tasty links.

• For the past 70 years or so, people have been breeding tomatoes for a uniform red color, but in the process, a gene that increases sugar content in tomatoes was inactivated. The gene, SlGLK2, increases the formation of chloroplasts, which are responsible for producing sugars through photosynthesis. Researchers have shown that by re-inserting an intact copy of the gene into tomatoes, they could increase the amount of glucose and fructose by up to 40%, while still retaining the uniform color ripening trait. Too bad they weren’t actually able to taste them (federal regulations prohibit sampling experimental crops). [url]
• Researchers have found that today’s Fuji apples are mealier, less flavorful, and more susceptible to disease than they were in the 1970s. The culprit: climate change. Studies in controlled temperature environments have shown that higher temperatures have been linked to a decrease in taste and texture in apples. Who knows what other crops might also have been changed due to global warming? [url]
• University of Florida researchers have discovered that they can improve the taste of fruits by exposing them to far-red light. They were able to use specific wavelengths of light to manipulate the production of volatile compounds that control aroma and taste in fruits like tomatoes, strawberries, and blueberries. Imagine your produce tasting even better after being stored in your far-red-light-equipped refrigerator! [url]

If you’d like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: apples, breeding, climate change, crops, diet, farming, food, fruits, gmo, taste, tomato, vegetables
Companies: usda

DailyDirt: Super Foods… To The Rescue

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

While there are a lot of debates going around about the wisdom of genetically modified organisms, a bunch of food scientists are working with edible concoctions that aren’t GMOs. Traditional breeding of naturally-occurring varieties of fruits and vegetables can still produce some pretty amazing results. And ultimately, consumers are voting with their purchases — which is creating all kinds of food innovations. Here are just a few examples.

• This is a fascinating video on some of the latest in apple breeding — “apples of the future” are on the way! There are apples that don’t brown after their cut, apples that have as much vitamin C as oranges, apple trees that have no branches without pruning, etc. [url]
• The pork technology behind McDonald’s McRib was originally meant to create a faux pork chop. Instead, McDonald’s created a “restructured meat” that took the form of a boneless backrib. [url]
• Super broccoli is a variety of this vegetable that could reduce cholesterol — without any genetic modification. Other super vegetables could have enhanced levels of vitamin D, calcium or omega-3 fatty acids. [url]
• To discover more food-related links, check out what’s floating around in StumbleUpon. [url]

By the way, StumbleUpon can also recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

Filed Under: apples, broccoli, food, gmo, innovation, pork, traditional breeding, vitamins
Companies: cornell, mcdonald's