Boingboing.net: "Although an attempt to protect the company's trademark, the [legal] letters have raised snickers after they were leaked on to the web.

"Bloggers have been making fun of the examples Google's lawyers deem acceptable. They included: 'Appropriate: I ran a Google search to check out that guy from the party. Inappropriate: I googled that hottie'."

AgonyFunkle: "We profusely apologise for misusing your brand name oh Great One. We also apologise for assuming you were a maverick company that didn't care for such silly things."

BusinessWeek: "Its recent inclusion as a verb in the Oxford English Dictionary confirms what competitors feared: Google means search to an army of Web users."

Technopedia: If google becomes a verb, Google is going to extra publicity without spending a single dime ... The only reason that I can think of this decision to fight google as a verb is that the word google would become so diluted that people would forget that Google is actually a company and not a word in the English dictionary."

Muscular Liberals: "Has someone had an intelligence bypass at Google? Have they never heard of Hoovers?"

Read the Times Online story here.

Times Recommends

• Lies and cover-up at MG Rover exposed by report
• High oil prices push manufacturing costs up
• Primark founder steps down as chief executive