Trademark lawyers at Google are cautious about the usage of the word Google. They are afraid that the trademark may fall to common usage like the fate of other successful products like "zippers, baby oil, brassieres, trampolines, thermos, cellophane, escalator, elevator, dry ice and many more".

The verb 'Google' was officially added to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) on June 15, 2006, and to the 11th edition of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary in July 2006, an honor that's simultaneously highly flattering and faintly unsettling. Consider, for example, this passage from a New York Times story published last May:

"Jim sent a message introducing himself and asking, 'Do you want to make a movie?'" Mr. Fry recalled in a telephone interview from his home in Buda, Tex. 'So we Googled him, he passed the test, and T called him. That was in March 1996; we spent the summer coming up with the story, and we pitched it that fall.'"

Now, since Larry and Sergey didn't actually launch Google until 1998, Mr. Fry's usage of 'Google' is as distressing to Google's trademark lawyers as it is thrilling to their marketing folks. So, lest the name go the way of the elevators and escalators of yesteryear, they thought it was time they offered this quick semantic primer.

"A trademark is a word, name, symbol or device that identifies a particular company's products or services. Google is a trademark identifying Google Inc. and our search technology and services. While we're pleased that so many people think of us when they think of searching the web, let's face it, we do have a brand to protect, so we'd like to make clear that you should please only use "Google" when you’re actually referring to Google Inc. and our services." says Michael Krantz on the Google Blog.

Here are some hopefully helpful examples.

Usage: 'Google' as noun referring to, well, us.
Example: "I just love Google, they're soooo cute and cuddly and adorable and awesome!"
Google lawyers say: Good. Very, very good. There's no question here that you're referring to Google Inc. as a company. Use it widely, and hey, tell a friend.

Usage: 'Google' as verb referring to searching for information on, um, Google.
Example: "I googled him on the well-known website Google.com and he seems pretty interesting."
Google lawyers say: Well, we're happy at least that it's clear you mean searching on Google.com. As our friends at Merriam-Webster note, to "Google" means "to use the Google search engine to find information about (as a person) on the World Wide Web."

Usage: 'Google' as verb referring to searching for information via any conduit other than Google.
Example: "I googled him on Yahoo and he seems pretty interesting."
Google lawyers say: Bad. Very, very bad. You can only "Google" on the Google search engine. If you absolutely must use one of our competitors, please feel free to "search" on Yahoo or any other search engine.

In the end.... can Google win this battle? I don't think so!