{"id":137278,"date":"2014-08-15T22:26:45","date_gmt":"2014-08-15T22:26:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=137278"},"modified":"2014-08-15T22:26:45","modified_gmt":"2014-08-15T22:26:45","slug":"seventh-circuit-saves-batman-crazy-trademark-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/sicence-technology\/seventh-circuit-saves-batman-crazy-trademark-attack\/","title":{"rendered":"Seventh Circuit Saves Batman From Crazy Trademark Attack"},"content":{"rendered":"
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DANIEL NAZER<\/em><\/p>\n

The events depicted in the superhero movie\u00a0The Dark Knight Rises<\/i><\/a>\u00a0<\/i>are not real. For example, when Cat Woman pursues software called \u201cClean Slate<\/a>\u201d to erase all traces of her criminal past, you are watching a fictional character seek fictional software. If that point strikes you as obvious, then you may have trouble comprehending the\u00a0trademark claim<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0Fortres Grand v. Warner Brothers<\/i>. In that case, software company Fortres Grand claimed that the movie\u2019s use of the words \u2018clean slate\u2019 infringed its trademark on a real piece of software with the that name.<\/p>\n

Last year, with the help of Professor Eugene Volokh and\u00a0UCLA\u2019s First Amendment Amicus Brief Clinic<\/a>, EFF filed a\u00a0brief<\/a>\u00a0urging the Seventh Circuit to reject this claim. We explained that trademark claims like this threaten creative expression. There are many reasons why artists might want to use a mark (either real or invented) in a book or movie. Janis Joplin sang, \u201cLord, won\u2019t you buy me a Mercedes Benz.\u201d And cartoons and movies have used fictional marks (such as ACME or Skynet) that share names with existing products. Artists should not fear litigation every time they use a term that echoes a trademark.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, trademark law does not favor silly claims based on fictional products. A major issue before the court was whether, for the purpose of evaluating similarity between the products at issue, it should compare Fortres Grand\u2019s real-world software to the fictional clean slate software or to the movie. The Seventh Circuit wrote that the law \u201ccompels lower courts to look to the movie, since it is [Warner Bros.\u2019] only tangible product in the marketplace about which consumers could be confused.\u201d Since a superhero movie is nothing like software, this effectively settled the trademark question. Having decided on that basis, the Seventh Circuit declined to decide whether the First Amendment also provides Warner Bros. with a defense.<\/p>\n

While the Seventh Circuit ruled on fairly narrow grounds, its decision should still discourage future frivolous claims against fictional works. Most important, the appeals court affirmed the district court\u2019s decision to throw this case out early on a motion to dismiss. That is good news for smaller creators who, unlike Warner Bros., might not be able to afford protracted litigation. This time, a victory for Batman is a victory for free speech.<\/p>\n

This piece<\/a> was reprinted by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DANIEL NAZER The events depicted in the superhero movie\u00a0The Dark Knight Rises\u00a0are not real. For example, when Cat Woman pursues software called \u201cClean Slate\u201d to erase all traces of her criminal past, you are watching a fictional character seek fictional software. If that point strikes you as obvious, then you may have trouble comprehending the\u00a0trademark […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":137279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,13],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-137278","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"category-sicence-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}