[Foundation-l] Wikipedia trademark registration in Germany

Mon Jul 12 22:10:40 UTC 2004

Michael Snow wrote:

> Well, nothing in the classes of goods covered by this trademark 
> application should keep us from being able to register our own 
> trademark. So this seems to be more a minor nuisance, rather than a 
> fraudulent registration we would *need* to get overturned promptly.

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.

> I'm assuming that German trademark practices aren't that different 
> from the US, since international agreements in the field mean that at
>  least some basic principles should be consistent.

> It still would have been nice to make a timely objection, but at 
> least this Jörg Nagel isn't blatantly infringing our trademark. It 
> does make it difficult if we want to distribute Wikipedia-related 
> 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") this trade mark doesn't prevent us from
producing t-shirts and other merchandise with the wikipedia logo and
name on it.

> I wonder if that's what he had in mind, and what he intends to do 
> with the trademark. Make a profit by selling it to us, or by forcing 
> us to use his firm's services for merchandising?

One or the other IMO.

> 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.

greetings,
elian