[Foundation-l] Re: Wikipedia trademark registration in Germany
Michael Snow <[email protected]> Mon, 12 Jul 2004 21:39:12 -0700
| Newsgroups | gmane.org.wikimedia.legal,gmane.org.wikimedia.foundation |
|---|---|
| Message-ID | <[email protected]> |
This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --===============0881650857== Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="------------000802090309010303020403" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------000802090309010303020403 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Elisabeth Bauer wrote: >Michael Snow wrote: > >> Well, nothing in the classes of goods covered by this trademark=20 >> application should keep us from being able to register our own=20 >> trademark. So this seems to be more a minor nuisance, rather than a=20 >> fraudulent registration we would *need* to get overturned promptly. > >I agree. To register the trademark for our own "business" (online &=20 >print publications, CD-editions) is much more urgent. If someone catches= =20 >these fields before us, we _really_ have a problem. > Is anybody monitoring this, in case somebody does try to register one of=20 our trademarks? I'm only familiar with the US Patent & Trademark Office,=20 which allows you to search online for pending and registered marks. I=20 haven't tried to check for competing registrations in other countries. Wacht irgendjemand darauf, falls jemand zuk=FCnftig versucht, noch eine=20 von unseren Marken einzutragen? >> It still would have been nice to make a timely objection, but at=20 >> least this J=F6rg Nagel isn't blatantly infringing our trademark. It=20 >> does make it difficult if we want to distribute Wikipedia-related=20 >> merchandise in Germany, though. > >A colleague of mine who is a lawyer told me that even this would not >necessarily constitute a problem. We would not be allowed to found a >T-Shirt company "Wikipedia sports wear", but in his opinion (why do >lawyers always have "opinions") > In my opinion, it's because when lawyers explain the law to people, they=20 often keep in mind that in spite of their professional training, lawyers=20 do not get to decide what the law *is*. Definitive interpretation=20 generally belongs to the courts. So this formulation is common in the=20 profession due to a variety of motivations (trying to be precise, not=20 wanting to be proved wrong, avoiding liability for malpractice, etc.).=20 But this is all just my opinion. >this trade mark doesn't prevent us from producing t-shirts and other mer= chandise with the wikipedia logo and >name on it. > Maybe or maybe not, depending on the details of German trademark law,=20 so I'll defer to people with more expertise on that. But even if this=20 was ultimately legal to do, I have to assume the similarity to Nagel's=20 trademark would make it more difficult for us if he raised objections. >> I'd be a little surprised if he intends to start a Wikipedia brand of >> clothing on his own. Was this application triggered by some of our >> German publicity, I wonder? Just some random thoughts. > >Seems so - the application was just one week after the big media echo. > Genau das hatte ich bemerkt. --Michael Schnee --------------000802090309010303020403 Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1"> <title></title> </head> <body text="#000000" bgcolor="#ffffff"> Elisabeth Bauer wrote:<br> <blockquote type="cite"> <pre>Michael Snow wrote: ><i> Well, nothing in the classes of goods covered by this trademark </i>><i> application should keep us from being able to register our own </i>><i> trademark. So this seems to be more a minor nuisance, rather than a </i>><i> fraudulent registration we would *need* to get overturned promptly. </i> I agree. To register the trademark for our own "business" (online & print publications, CD-editions) is much more urgent. If someone catches these fields before us, we _really_ have a problem.</pre> </blockquote> Is anybody monitoring this, in case somebody does try to register one of our trademarks? I'm only familiar with the US Patent & Trademark Office, which allows you to search online for pending and registered marks. I haven't tried to check for competing registrations in other countries.<br> <br> Wacht irgendjemand darauf, falls jemand zukünftig versucht, noch eine von unseren Marken einzutragen?<br> <blockquote type="cite"> <pre>><i> It still would have been nice to make a timely objection, but at </i>><i> least this Jörg Nagel isn't blatantly infringing our trademark. It </i>><i> does make it difficult if we want to distribute Wikipedia-related </i>><i> merchandise in Germany, though. </i> A colleague of mine who is a lawyer told me that even this would not necessarily constitute a problem. We would not be allowed to found a T-Shirt company "Wikipedia sports wear", but in his opinion (why do lawyers always have "opinions")</pre> </blockquote> In my opinion, it's because when lawyers explain the law to people, they often keep in mind that in spite of their professional training, lawyers do not get to decide what the law *is*. Definitive interpretation generally belongs to the courts. So this formulation is common in the profession due to a variety of motivations (trying to be precise, not wanting to be proved wrong, avoiding liability for malpractice, etc.). But this is all just my opinion.<br> <blockquote type="cite"> <pre>this trade mark doesn't prevent us from producing t-shirts and other merchandise with the wikipedia logo and name on it.</pre> </blockquote> Maybe or maybe not, depending on the details of German trademark law, so I'll defer to people with more expertise on that. But even if this was ultimately legal to do, I have to assume the similarity to Nagel's trademark would make it more difficult for us if he raised objections.<br> <blockquote type="cite"> <pre>><i> I'd be a little surprised if he intends to start a Wikipedia brand of </i>><i> clothing on his own. Was this application triggered by some of our </i>><i> German publicity, I wonder? Just some random thoughts. </i> Seems so - the application was just one week after the big media echo.</pre> </blockquote> Genau das hatte ich bemerkt.<br> <br> --Michael Schnee<br> </body> </html> --------------000802090309010303020403-- --===============0881650857== Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list [email protected] http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l --===============0881650857==--