newspaper skirmish settled (for now)

The Tampa Tribune and St. Pete Times have been fighting over the use of the name “Tampa Bay Times” for a while.  This week, both sides reached an agreement on the use of the moniker.  Since the two papers were able to work it out without resorting to any further lawsuits, we’ll let them each tell their favorite parts of the story…

Tribune:

The parent company of the St. Petersburg Times will not be able to use the phrase “Tampa Bay Times” without restrictions for the next five years…

Times:

[but will have] unlimited use of the phrase thereafter.

In addition, the Tribune will transfer to three web site domains it currently controls, including tampabaytimes.net, tampabaytimes.biz and tampabaytimes.info. Both sides agreed not to use each other’s trademarks for online search engine advertising.

So, assuming daily newspapers are still around then, you can look for the debut of the Tampa Bay Times on or around January 1, 2012.

I suppose the Times may come after me alot sooner than that.