News and notes from around the interweb:
- ‘Crazed’ Thai Smile passenger rips plane’s emergency exit door open before takeoff
- New York’s Department of Financial Services is investigating Goldman Sachs Apple Card business for gender discrimination in credit decisions – because of a viral tweet about a husband and wife receiving markedly different credit lines when approved for the product.
- Virgin Hotels will enter the Las Vegas market without resort fees because those are deceptive.
- Zombie loyalty program JetPrivilege – whose associated airline Jet Airways no longer flies – is planning a makeover.
- Supreme Court will decide whether ‘Booking.com’ is too generic to trademark (whether adding ‘.com’ to a common word can be trademarked)
- Southwest Airlines… if you’re happy and you know it then you know what to do!
I could see myself losing my virginity in a resort fee-free hotel
If SW had seat assignments I’d probably fly them
Until numerous couples posts their credit scores and exact application data, I will consider this gender bias issue as total BS. But leave it to NY govt to never lose an opportunity to show how woke they are.
These trademark and copyright issues are very political. Take champagne. Most people world-wide call bubbly white wine champagne, no matter where it is made, making it a rather generic term, but it has been successfully trademarked and copyrighted in most of the globe. If the test is whether a word is generic, then revoke the rights to the word champagne (without the capital C).
Don in ATL:
Place name protected goods, like Champagne and Roquefort (cheese) and countless other examples are not really a trademark issue. It’s a different type of protection related to the place it was made. The protections don’t acrue necessarily to a particular maker, but to all makers in a region. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographical_indications_and_traditional_specialities_in_the_European_Union
It’s a horrible practice, but one that seems destined to continue for a while.