Traditionally, trade mark theory has been reluctant to protect advertising value from appropriation by third parties. Various justifications for this proposition have been put forward, most notably the free-riding theory associated with overbroad trade mark monopolies, the ethical condemnation...

Contemporary analysis of trademark rights rests on the premise that consumer confusion constitutes the primary, if not the sole, rational basis of protection. Dilution theory has gradually come to be considered an almost undesired exception to the general rule of confusion-based liability and...