Apple Sued Over Its Use Of 'iBook'Apple Sued Over Its Use Of 'iBook'

A New York book publisher has filed a lawsuit against Apple claiming its use of the term "iBook" violates the publisher's trademark, the second trademark infringement suit filed against the tech giant in less than a week.

The suit, filed yesterday by J.T. Colby and Co. in U.S. Southern District Court for New York, claims the trademark was acquired in 2006 and 2007 along with various assets of Byron Preiss, who had published more than 1,000 books under the "ibooks" brand starting in 1999.

Colby's suit acknowledges that Apple has a trademark for "iBook" related to its use on the personal computer the Mac maker sold from 1999 to 2006. However, Apple did not begin to use the term to describe an electronic book or method for delivering electronic books until 2010.

"Apple's use of the mark 'iBooks' to denote the electronic library that can be accessed via its iPad tablet computer and its iPhone is likely to overwhelm the good will of plaintiffs' 'ibooks' and 'ipicturebooks' marks and render them virtually worthless," the lawsuit states.
The lawsuit seeks injunctive relief as well as unspecified monetary damages.