Google Doodles Obvious Nod To…Some Games…Or Something…

Trademark

from the no-names-for-games dept

Google users have long noticed the search page's “doodles“, where Google redesigns their logo as an homage to something having to do with that day's history (Yes! I managed to link to a Techdirt story from two-thousand-and-freaking-two! Beat that, other Techdirt writers!). Often times these are nods to the birthdays of famous or important artists, scientists, or other historical figures and holidays. And if you have spent the past week or so living on Earth and aren't a rock, you can probably guess what these past days' doodles have been about.

But, as reader Jason writes in to note, the big Goog is apparently chilly on actually, you know, mentioning what the drawings are for when you roll over the image:

“The image url reference[d] the “opening ceremony” of something. But the tooltip for the image, which any seasoned Google user knows will tell you what's up with the logo that day, simply reads, “Hooray for sports!”

The two theories Jason came up with are that the search giant is afraid to even mention the sporting event in question for fear of reprisal by the committee that oversees said sporting event, or it's a sly poke in the eye at their overly aggressive sue-happy nature. Lord knows if the-games-that-shall-not-be-named are willing to go after gyro shops, a more prominent target like Google would seem to be a no-brainer. Now, it would seem to me that a prominent page like Google's home search page featuring the Olym…games-that-shall-not-be-named would be a great source of publicity for the sporting event, but thanks to the chilling effect created through lawsuit happy committees, that publicity is lost.

Filed Under: doodles, intellectual property, olympics
Companies: google