Cory, you may have missed the point:

   Shrinkage (the industry term for reduced inventory due to shoplifting) is bounded. In other words, I might only lose 5% of my inventory, but I keep the other 95%.

   Trademark dilution is unbounded. In other words, an equivalent 5% accepted abuse rate is conceivably enough to get a judge to accept the trademark has fallen into the public domain.

   That's called losing everything, permanently.

   If Walmart could lose the deed to a warehouse because somebody walked out with a stolen Coke -- would there be cavity searches? I can guarantee your membership agreement (and you'd have one) would expressly allow it.

   Cory, this is a semi-bug in trademark law; the real problems include the penalty for mishandling the law, the lack of civility during negotiations, and the non-differentiation between corporate-created context (Akamai, Google, etc.) and corporate-acquired context (Visa). IP is messy and immature -- what else is new?

--Dan