Social networking giant Facebook has filed a copyright infringement suit against a German counterpart, according to the Financial Times. StudiVZ is accused of “copying the look, feel, features and services” of Facebook, including its “wall” feature, according to the complaint filed Friday in California, the Financial Times reported.
The suit asserts that the sites are so similar that StudiVZ simply replaced Facebook’s “blue color scheme with a red one.” According to StudiVZ’s site, the Berlin-based company has 10 million users. The site was purchased last year by German publisher Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck.
Facebook launched its own German language version in March. It claimed that any differences between the two sites were “nominal” and accused StudiVZ of merely “replacing Facebook’s blue colour scheme with a red one”. Facebook said it was “seeking to end StudiVZ’s illegal activity to ensure that users are not confused and that Facebook’s reputation remains unharmed”.
StudiVZ could not be reached for comment. The site, which is based in Berlin, was bought last year by Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck, a German publishing company, which also could not be reached. Facebook, which was founded in 2004 by Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg, recently settled its own intellectual property dispute. It resolved a legal battle with ConnectU, a rival website launched at Harvard around the same time, whose owners claimed Mr Zuckerberg stole its idea for a site that allowed Harvard students to connect to each other online.
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