Facebook's new timeline profile is on time-out, as the social network delayed the beginning of its beta test of the new profile by about a week, to October 6.
It’s unclear whether the delay is the result of a lawsuit filed against the social network by Chicago-based Timelines.com, as paidContent reported Sunday that a federal judge refused to grant that company's request for a temporary restraining order, but Judge Edmond Chang left the door open for Timelines.com to attempt to seek the TRO again.
Timelines.com filed a trademark claim in an attempt to protect its digital scrapbooking site, saying in its complaint that it wanted to prevent itself "from being rolled over and quite possibly eliminated by … the world's largest and most powerful social media company."
Facebook product manager Sam Lessin said in a court filing that the social network wouldn’t roll out timeline before the two parties are slated to meet again in court tomorrowy, according to Mashable, which added that about 1.1 million users have already enabled developer access timeline features.
Until recently, we might have wagered that Facebook’s greater financial might would win in court, as had been the case with just about every single trademark dispute that arises.
However, last month’s settlement with Lamebook, after a year of litigation, allowed the satire site to continue to operate with its current name but using a disclaimer saying there’s no affiliation with Facebook.
Of course, a suit involving satire involves different legal issues than something like timeline does. But it will be interesting to see how this latest case turns out and what will become of Facebook’s newest profile format.
Readers: Do you think Timelines.com has a case, or will Facebook's rollout of the new profile proceed later this week?
Source: All Facebook
Monday, October 3, 2011