The gloves have come off between Overture and Google, (allowing their respective lawyers enough agility to hold on to their pens). Three issues ago we wrote about Google’s great fortune in gaining the search account for Europe’s largest ISP, T-Online from Overture. It seems that T-Online’s multi-year deal with Overture had a back out clause allowing them to dump Overture if Overture was ever bought by a competitor. T-Online considers Yahoo, (soon to be Overture’s new owner) a competitor, and cancelled the deal. In reaction, Overture applied for and was granted an injunction against T-Online, preventing them from replacing Overture results with results from Google. Problem is, T-Online had already replaced Overture with Google on August 7th.
While the deal between Yahoo and Overture has not been fully completed, it is expected to be closed sometime in the last quarter of this year. T-Online, on the other hand, claims to have not received the official injunction yet and will not necessarily comply. According to an IDG News article by Gillian Law, a spokesperson for T-Online said, “We have not received any injunction so far. Once an injunction reaches us, it will be given to our legal department for thorough examination.”
The #1 spot for the keyword “injunction” costs just $0.16 per click through on Overture though one can be sure the real thing has cost them quite a bit more in the European theatre.