eHarmony wants to be the only eHarmony of any eHarmony

eHarmony’s legal department is sending requests to news outlets to stop writing statements in the form of “XXXXX is the eHarmony of YYYYY.”

Read what TechCrunch.com received this week:

Genericization of “eHarmony” trademark

Hello,

On February 18, 2011, TechCrunch correspondent Leena Rao published an article entitled “RoundPegg Raises $1.27 Million To Be The eHarmony For Jobs.” While we appreciate the reference to our business and matching technology that were intended to be communicated via the title, I’m sure you can appreciate that such use of our eHarmony brand can lead to genericization of the brand, thereby affecting the goodwill and other intangible trademark rights we have so heavily invested in.

From that perspective, we ask that TechCrunch refrain from using the eHarmony brand in any way that would compare other companies’ products to that of ours, especially when it comes to their matching technology or algorithm (e.g. “eHarmony of ___________”).

Thanks for your attention to this matter.

Best Regards,

Steve

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Steve S. Nikkhou || Sr. Director, Legal Affairs || eHarmony, Inc.

Nikkhou must be bored silly with his job. The phrase “eharmony of” has more than 7,000 Google search result hits. It’s a decade-old company and if “eharmony” has become a generic term for any matchmaking system, it already did years ago.

A better use of your time, Mr. Nikkhou, is to make sure your privacy policies and practices for eHarmony Canada, Australia, UK and Brazil are actually legal in those respective countries. It’s only a matter of time before a data retention class action lawsuit falls on your lap regarding your 40 million user accounts. We know you never delete user profiles. We’re just saying.