The-Coveted v. TheCoveted: Lawyers Weigh-In on the Blog War
You've undoubtedly heard of TheCoveted.com, a darling new website that gives us a peek inside the homes and wardrobes of fashion industry favorites. You've also probably heard about the little war raging between this new site and Jeanine Jacob, founder of Independent Fashion Bloggers, as well as her very own blog, The-Coveted.com. Both sites, thus, are called The Coveted, and Internet commenters have had a field day trashing the "new" Coveted and defending the "old" Coveted. And rightly so. While it's true that the sites are very different in style and audience, there's just no way The Coveted founders Erin Kleinberg and Stephanie Mark didn't know The-Coveted existed before they launched their site. Sure, they might not be subscribing to Jacob's site on their RSS feeds, but for someone to launch a website/blog and not even Google the name to make sure nothing else was named similarly seems pretty absurd. But that's exactly what Kleinberg and Mark are claiming. In fact, in a letter to Jeanine Jacob's lawyer responding to a request that TheCoveted.com cease using that domain (you can read it here), the duo's lawyer says that they were "unaware of your clients' website" and that if Jacob doesn't leave them alone, they're going to sue her. This all seems a bit insane to us, but we decided to consult a couple of lawyers to make sure we weren't missing an inextricable point. The conclusion: While in bad form, TheCoveted.com probably didn't do anything illegal by using that domain. However, Jacob does have a case--even if it's a weak one.