[DallasFlier]

I didn't expect you to agree with me, and I emphasize again I'm not arguing with your expert opinion on the merits according to our legal system. But my opinion stands that its a bit ridiculous and symptomatic of what I and a LOT of other people think is wrong with our legal system today.

You said "By choosing the name blackjack, Samsung is, arguably, taking advantage of a name and goodwill associated with the Blackberry name." My response to that is that yes, that's definitely "arguable" as I don't believe the name "BlackJack" has EVER been associated with the BlackBerry name, prior to Samsung's intro of this phone. Before Samsung came out with this phone, I doubt you could have found a single individual who would have associated that name with BlackBerry. If "BlackJack" was a nickname associated with BlackBerry prior to Samsung's intro, then I'd think there should be a case - just like if someone came out with a phone called "CrackBerry" because that is a name that HAS been associated with BlackBerry.

I'd be willing to wager that if you polled a large group of people at random, that probably not more than 1 in 100 of them would associate "BlackJack" with "BlackBerry". The people polled would separate primarily into two groups - those who would have NO idea what either name was referring to, and those familiar with BlackBerry - and the huge majority of THOSE would know that RIM has never had anything called or labelled "BlackJack." The fact that a very FEW *dumb* consumers would mistakenly associate the two (this includes the single *dumb* online reseller) shouldn't be enough to force Samsung to quit using the name. And taking the same poll I mentioned earlier I'm sure you could also find, for instance, a few *dumb* consumers out there who would claim that *any* QWERTY phone/PDA that's black is a "BlackBerry", so does that mean that based on our legal system no other company should be allowed to build and sell a black QWERTY PDA/phone device? Should RIM be allowed to take legal ownership of anything and everything "black" associated with phones or PDA's? Hardly, I think!