The saga continues. I’m trying to run an AdWords ad for my mom’s Kumon center. She has been told by Google that she can’t use the term “Kumon”—the name of her company—in her ad because it’s a trademarked term. I asked Google to tell me who the person is who can give permission to Kumon holders. This is their unsatisfying reply:
Thank you for your email. I understand you would like to have contact information of the trademark owner who filed a complaint for the trademark term ‘Kumon.’ Please note that we are unable to provide this information. If you have authorization to use this term in your ads then I suggest you ask the individual who has provided you this authorization to follow the trademark authorization steps outlined at http://www.google.com/tm_complaint_adwords.html.
Yes, I can try to get my Mom to get her regional franchise office to track down the person in Japan who is responsible for this policy. Or Google can just tell me. sigh.
“Almost every American I know does trade large portions of his life for entertainment, hour by weeknight hour, binge by Saturday binge, Facebook check by Facebook check. I’m one of them. In the course of writing this I’ve watched all 13 episodes of House of Cards and who knows how many more West Wing episodes, and I’ve spent any number of blurred hours falling down internet rabbit holes. All instead of reading, or writing, or working, or spending real time with people I love.”
“Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones.”
You can scroll right easily by holding down the SHIFT key and using your scroll wheel. (Firefox users trying this will end up jumping to old Web pages until a) Firefox releases a fix, b) they change their settings like so.)