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 jimbolina25 wrote:
so with all the "if GW uses something enough its theirs",

what happens with this then?

https://www.teefury.com/

They are clearly the Colonial Marines from Aliens, maybe they used the Aliens imagery, and the Space Marines name so that it doesn't piss off either GW or Ridley Scott?

Spartans and ODSTs and Marines from Halo, Starship Troopers, Astartes, Colonial Marines, any Marines on the Starship Yamamoto, heck, probably even certain real-life Astronouts are Space Marines- because any Marine that is in Space is a Space Marine.

Really, GW ought to instead brand their products as Adeptus Astartes.

space marine is a term that has been around longer than GW. the book that starship troopers was based on made the term popular as did many other sci fi books of the early 80's.... I support this product and will buy one if GW try they're normal cease and desist bullcrap

mullet_steve wrote:
space marine is a term that has been around longer than GW. the book that starship troopers was based on made the term popular as did many other sci fi books of the early 80's.... I support this product and will buy one if GW try they're normal cease and desist bullcrap

Starship Troops never called the characters in the book "Space Marines". They were "Mobile Infantry". Heinlen reportedly used the term in another book through.

The rule of "First" doesn't apply to who invented a Trademark, just who filed it first. GW filed because it was important to their business model and at the time they were the only ones really using it. It's become a lot more common now, which could be argued has started to enter common use and become less related to GW and more related to all sci-fi. Now if that happens and GW loses the rights to "Space Marine" we'll likely see Space Marines be re-branded as "Adeptus Astartes" on the packaging and their common name in universe stay "Space Marine".

Just my $.02.

EDIT: From Wikipedia regarding Heinlen's use of the term "Space Marine":

The phrase "space marines" appears in Robert A. Heinlein's "Misfit"[d] (1939) and is again used in "The Long Watch"[e] (1941) which is referenced in his later novel Space Cadet (1948), in all cases before Smith had used the phrase. Heinlein's Starship Troopers (1959) is considered the defining work for the concept, although it does not use the term "space marine".

Also, I'd like to note that if GW had been beaten to the filing of it for the things they've registered it for (games, books, ect), it'd had likely expired through disuse due to the limitations on how long a trademark can be maintained (EDIT: Namely that is has to be actively defended and in use and if a period of disuse elapses it expires automatically). The terms for disuse are actually what makes GW so sue-happy because to prevent loss of the Trademark they have to defend it pretty much all the time.

I'm not saying that's a good thing, or that GW isn't being a over zealous there, but that they're driven to do so through the legal system. Blame trademark laws -and- GW, not just GW on that.

It may have been covered already in this long thread but GW dont seem to have an exclusive claim on 'Space Marine' as a miniature anyway .
Asgard Space Marines have been around since 1974 apparently

Yep, and those same figures are still available under that name from Alternative Armies. Over the years the production rights have gone through 3 or 4 different companies, but they never ceased production.

The point is that if a word or phrase is in common usage within an industrial sector, you cannot make it into a trademark and prevent other people from using it.

Imagine the chaos if Starbucks decided to trademark the phrase "carrot cake".

The question therefore is whether "space marine" is a widely used phrase in SF and SF games, and it is.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The point is that if a word or phrase is in common usage within an industrial sector, you cannot make it into a trademark and prevent other people from using it.

Imagine the chaos if Starbucks decided to trademark the phrase "carrot cake".

The question therefore is whether "space marine" is a widely used phrase in SF and SF games, and it is.

I concur. A marine is basically an embarked soldier, If we ever send soldiers into space, surely by definition of the term they will all be marines?

Think about that.. If in 100 years Nato send a ship to mars with a security detail of marines, will GW bankrupt the human races endeavours with a hefty law suit?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Imagine the chaos if Starbucks decided to trademark the phrase "carrot cake".

I draw the line at anyone trying to copyright my carrot cake!

I have learned a lot in this thread, thanks for keeping it on track and informative!

In the US, filing first only matters Patent law, not copyright law.

Not sure what that is in relation to - but first is important in all aspects of IP...trademarks, copyright and patent...though filing is generally a technicality, even with regards to patents as prior art that is not registered with the patent office has priority over a registered patent.

There are several instances where a local company has been using a trademark to do business under for years (even decades) before another company comes along using that trademark. The priority of rights is based on first use of trademarks (and theoretically copyrights - though copyrights get a bit more murky when it comes to those issues). The small local company who gets bullied by the larger company then can file a counter suit to strip the larger company of their trademark because they had priority to the trademark.

This even applies when dealing with registered trademarks versus non-registered marks. Most of the time, a small company will not bother to register their trademarks - it isn't something that is a priority for most small business owners. Several years later you can have a large national chain register a trademark and invest [hundreds of] thousands of dollars in developing a brand for that mark. A trigger happy corporate attorney fires off a C&D against the small company when they see they are using the mark the big company wants to use...hoping the small company just rolls over and dies...they counter sue...injunction...stripped of registered trademark...legal fees...fired attorney...

If you are talking specifically to the case of the Asgard Miniatures Space Marines - they were advertised in Dragon Magazine and reviewed there. They also were advertised in White Dwarf magazine (I don't recall if they were reviewed there though). The advertising is often enough evidence to establish "doing business" in a geographic region - and with the magazines having near global distribution, it establishes a priority of rights to Asgard, and all subsequent owners of the production rights for the product.

In the same way, the FGU game Space Marine was also advertised in most of the game magazines of the time and IIRC was reviewed in White Dwarf (Issue 8 off the top of my head...but I might be off by one or two issues up or down). Again, that establishes two companies with a higher priority of rights to the term "Space Marine" as a trademark.

A third one - which is often overlooked...but a heavy hitter in this field is actually Hasbro, by way of Kenner through their Aliens Action Figures. Although the term used in the Aliens movies was Colonial Marines - the term used on the Kenner Action Figures was Space Marines. They started using that term with their first Alien licensed product in 1979 through to their last in 1997 or 1998. Because they used the term and it wasn't part of the license itself - ownership of the term (if any ownership were to exist) would have been transferred to Hasbro when they purchased Kenner. Granted, the earlier 1979 range was extremely short lived...apparently little kids were not quite ready to play with toy monsters that want to suck your face, lay an egg in your chest, burst out and try to eat you...

http://www.alienlegend.com/Memorabilia/Kenner/index.htm

If you click on the cards, you can clearly see that each are labeled as Space Marines - not Colonial Marines.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
Not sure what that is in relation to...

Registering.

 Breotan wrote:

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
Not sure what that is in relation to...

Registering.

Righty-Oh. In that case then, it is important to note that the patent doesn't actually matter either (regarding the counter purpose of an unpatented invention). If you follow the various "patent busting" projects, you see them come up with loads of examples of prior art which demonstrates that an idea that someone registered was actually common place prior to it being registered as a patent. The ones who play the late patent game are generally patent trolls (or one step up from them) and are trying to cash in on "licensing" things like toasted bread.

I believe that in the UK, a registered trademark will generally take precedence over an unregistered one, even if the unregistered one has been around for a few years before that point. That's assuming that no-one objects to the registration in time (I think you get 6 months to do so). So, it's possible that GW's IP department assumes US law works the same way. It wouldn't be their first error.

 Dysartes wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Imagine the chaos if Starbucks decided to trademark the phrase "carrot cake".

I draw the line at anyone trying to copyright my carrot cake!

Monsanto is trying to copyright tomatoes, dont count?

Monsanto sees all life forms on Earth as its personal invention. In some cases Monsanto got through with this. They must be the inspiration for GW lawyers

 Breotan wrote:
In the US, filing first only matters Patent law, not copyright law.

Actually, from what I've been reading (mind you I'm not a lawyer, or a trademark expert, just someone who has been trying to understand this case) the rule of "FIRST!" applies to trademarks too. Copyright is a separate mess from that.

 Breotan wrote:
In the US, filing first only matters Patent law, not copyright law.

Filing first no longer matters in patent law either. I forget the case law specifically, but it is no longer a "race to the patent office." The priority date can go back as much as a year prior to filing the patent application, I believe.

Sean's point is that a patent is only valid if it is new, useful, and not obvious in light of the prior art, i.e. relevant publicly available information.

My point is slightly different in that even when you are talking about competing patent applications, filing an application first is not good enough, as the priority date of a patent can go back before the date on which the application was filed. In other words, if I invent something, and keep it private because I am planning on seeking patent protection, and you invent roughly the same thing a short while later and actually file your patent application before mine, that you filed first is not important. It is the date on which the invention was "reduced to practice" that matters.

The Dwarf Wolf wrote:
Monsanto is trying to copyright tomatoes, dont count?

To be more specific, they patent the specific genetic strain that they develop, typically to promote some 'useful' feature, like resistance to weather/drought or pests.

This lets them retain control over their seed supply, and it's basically an annual 'subscription' if a farmer wants to keep growing their advantaged crops.

Monsanto's 'ownership' of their genetically engineered tomato is both verifiable (genetic fingerprint) and useful (GM crops generally have much, much higher yields/profits/margins/sustainability than non-modified).

GW is having a problem showing that they actually own any of this stuff that they're claiming ownership to. Monsanto would not/does not have nearly that amount of difficulty with their strains.

AFAIK, Monsanto now has the patent on all corn with a certain minimum protein level, including traditional 10,000 year old breeds from India. AFAIK Monsanto has a patent on a breast cancer gene, so all parents of children having that gene could be asked to pay dues. A famer complained about GMO-contamination of his crop by a neighboring field, and got successfully sued by Monsanto for patent infringement. But all this is off topic here.

Monsanto doesn't have the Breast Cancer gene patent, but it's in a similar vein of troubling precedent of copyrighting genes. Hopefully the Supreme Court ruling in a few months on that case will set a precedent not allowing them to copyright any interesting bit they suck out of you like they can and do now.

Guys - if you KNOW you're about to post Off Topic stuff, don't.

OK?

Back on topic:

Based on recent filings it looks like a few of the junior associates at Winston and Strawn have been let go, or lateraled to other firms - CHS put in requests to have them taken off the case. Messrs. Raffensperger, and Morehous.

czakk wrote:
Back on topic:

Based on recent filings it looks like a few of the junior associates at Winston and Strawn have been let go, or lateraled to other firms - CHS put in requests to have them taken off the case. Messrs. Raffensperger, and Morehous.

Do you think that means anything, or just an artefact of the case having dragged out over a couple years mixed with the usual career progression for junior associates?

They have been bringing people in and out of the case throughout the course of the trial. Some is no doubt because they recieved the OJT they needed, but also the case is moving from one stage to the next and the final stage wont benefit as much from worker bee lawyers as the first couple years of research and writing.

 Dawnbringer wrote:

czakk wrote:
Back on topic:

Based on recent filings it looks like a few of the junior associates at Winston and Strawn have been let go, or lateraled to other firms - CHS put in requests to have them taken off the case. Messrs. Raffensperger, and Morehous.

Do you think that means anything, or just an artefact of the case having dragged out over a couple years mixed with the usual career progression for junior associates?

Just the normal career progression and a long case. There's a pretty significant burn out / firing / moving on rate for young lawyers at large firms. Something like 60-75% are gone from their original firm by year five.

czakk wrote:

 Dawnbringer wrote:

czakk wrote:
Back on topic:

Based on recent filings it looks like a few of the junior associates at Winston and Strawn have been let go, or lateraled to other firms - CHS put in requests to have them taken off the case. Messrs. Raffensperger, and Morehous.

Do you think that means anything, or just an artefact of the case having dragged out over a couple years mixed with the usual career progression for junior associates?

Just the normal career progression and a long case. There's a pretty significant burn out / firing / moving on rate for young lawyers at large firms. Something like 60-75% are gone from their original firm by year five.

I agree.

Firm shifts are very common for young associate lawyers. They have enough experience to meaningfully shop their skills around and, most importantly, it is much easier for a younger lawyer to avoid imputing conflicts of interest when they change firms than older lawyers. Simply put, they have worked on fewer cases and owe fiduciary duties of confidentiality to fewer clients. Conflicts of interest and transient lawyers are a big, big pain to deal with. New firms may have to set up physical and electronic screening procedures, clients may have to be notified, and cases may have to be referred to other firms. It can amount to a lot of costly work for a firm.

http://ia600405.us.archive.org/18/items/gov.uscourts.ilnd.250791/gov.uscourts.ilnd.250791.357.0.pdf

Joint status report.

CHS still going for the hail mary

"When the Plaintiff cannot even identify any symbol consistently used as a source identifier, CHS cannot be expected to defend against these unidentified marks. For that reason as well, the icon marks should be excluded. "

czakk wrote:
http://ia600405.us.archive.org/18/items/gov.uscourts.ilnd.250791/gov.uscourts.ilnd.250791.357.0.pdf

Joint status report.

CHS still going for the hail mary

"When the Plaintiff cannot even identify any symbol consistently used as a source identifier, CHS cannot be expected to defend against these unidentified marks. For that reason as well, the icon marks should be excluded. "

I do not know if I would call that a "Hail Mary." I would think that not being able to trademark a word used in a book is, like, black letter trademark law. And, well, if you can't tell me what your trademark is, how in the Hell can a customer know what it is?

I would be dismayed to see the Court to rule against Defendant's MIL on that point.

"Tell me what trademark I am infringing, tell me when you have used it, tell me how you have used it, and tell me how I have infringed it."

"Space Wolves. You do Space Wolves."

"Okay, is 'Space Wolves' the trademark?"

"Maybe."

"When did you use the 'Space Wolves' mark, remember how I asked that?"

"Oh yea, ummm...we used it in, like, 2004 or something. That was before you sold anything, right? Yea, we used it in '04."

"Fine, so how have I infringed it?

"You do Space Wolves, like that thing there, and you say 'Space Wolf."

"Okay, well, that's a start."

"OH YEA! You like infringe these trademarked drawings too. These are 'Space Wolves' drawings!"

"Seriously? the trial was supposed to be, like, a week ago. I thought those were copyright claims."

"YEA. They're 'Space Wolf' trademark claims too. Gotcha!"

"So when I asked you about your trademarks...you didn't mention those drawings."

"So, we gave the drawings to you...at some point. That totes counts."

"You said we infringed your copyright on those."

"Naa, we just said 'Space Wolves'. That could have meant, like, anything bra."

"That is WHY we asked you to be specific. That is WHY the law REQUIRES you to be specific. Because the trial was SUPPOSED to be like a week ago, and we're just learning about this BS now. That's not cool."

"Naa, we're good. You do 'Space Wolves' we totes owns everything 'Space Wolves', totes do...everything."