April 20, 2009 by Ciaran Laval
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Bloomberg are carrying a story that Taser have launched a trademark infringement lawsuit against Linden Research Inc. due to people selling virtual versions of Taser weapons.
There's a cracking quote in the article:
"All of the defendants that sell virtual weaponry like plaintiff’s real ones, under the mark Taser for use in the Second Life programs and grids, also sell adult-only explicit images and scenes"
Yes I can see it now, some company is considering buying these stun guns RL and one of the board members objects:
"Hey I've seen these in Second Life, they're sold in stores where pornographic images are also displayed, we don't want these".
Other board member "What are you doing in a store that sells pornographic images in the first place?"
First board member "Oh crap, rumbled, I'm really Foxy HugeBoobs, part time singer and estate manager, I better resign my post here immediately."
I mean come on, who the hell is going to associate the real brand with the virtual ones? If Taser want to do a DMCA takedown then fine, but in all reality why don't Taser just hire someone to make official virtual replicas of their weapons and actually generate some positive publicity for their product?
I know IP infringement is important and Taser have every right to defend their trademark's, but do it for those reasons, don't come up with this inane nonsense that a virtual replica in Second Life will put people off their product, there's enough controversy about the product anyway.
If you're a content creator who makes these weapons you might want to change the name to something like stun gun or electroshock weapon PDQ before your products are taken off the market.
I also found some of the commentary in the article to be amusing:
"In the virtual world, participants create alter egos known as avatars that use real money to buy property, open businesses, dance at clubs, engage in combat or have sex."
A bit like RL then without the avatars, people dance and drink and screw RL, has this escaped Bloomberg?
Well they say there's no such thing as bad publicity, and that's the only winner here for Linden Research Inc. and Taser because this just smacks of being a waste of money on legal counsel, sure call out the IP infringement but don't bring pixellated boobies into the equation, that just makes your case look hollow.
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[...] so I didn't quite see what the fuss was all about and they were just a bit of fun anyway.Taser were threatening to sue Linden Lab over intellectual property inffringement and were making some silly claims along the lines of not [...]
Re: Drop the weapons or we'll sue
From what I understand a Trademark is only good for the categories you trademark it for. For instance SL is trademarked (SL.com) for software computer dashboards and yet also trademarked by Linden Lab for virtual worlds.
The key here is if you decide to trademark your product for various categories you must protect it under those categories to be valid. So the question is, has Taser trademarked their name to represent software and 3D models of the device that stuns virtual avatars? If so, they need to prove that their name is being used on such a product that they make and that they are protecting that particular product trademark. Seems to me like they are putting the cart before the horse here.
Re: Drop the weapons or we'll sue
As I've been commenting all over the place :) the DMCA is irrelevant here; a DMCA takedown notice is a claim of copyright infringement (that someone else is using your content), but Taser is claiming that someone else is using the Taser name on *their own* content (and thus causing damage to the brand etc). I'm somewhat surprised it surfaced as a lawsuit, rather than just a nice "please stop using our trademark illegally" letter from Taser's lawyers to the relevant parties. It will be interesting to see how the suit plays out, and if we ever find out why it went the way it did. (Maybe Taser couldn't get through the Lab's call-screening?)
Re: Drop the weapons or we'll sue
Taser are very close, uncomfortably closed I'd say, to losing their trademark. Hoover have ran into this situation in the UK where basically "I'm going to hoover the front room" is so common that Hoover won't win any trademark infringement cases on that matter.
Many people don't seem to even realise Taser is a trademark, they see it as a type of stun gun, not an actual brand, I have sympathy with them but I don't think that in most cases in Second Life that it is deliberate trademark infringement. That's not to say Taser shouldn't protest, just that they need to get real with the issue and not drag silliness like virtual drug taking and boobs into the equation.
Re: Drop the weapons or we'll sue
Please allow me to make two comments:
#1 I am "stunned" at the frivolous nature of such a shallow, potential legal threat.
#2 Imitation is the highest form of flattery...or so it has been said. Considering it's a virtual world, it's all just a bit surprising shocking.. I suppose I had better hide those beanbag-type 60's retro chairs that look like m&m's from the Hershey Company, makers of fine chocolates in the Real World. Good thing I wasn't selling them...I might have been virtually sued for all my virtual cash and had my otherwise unsullied virtual reputation called into question, yielding the demise of my virtual empire. :-)