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Fox Lawyers Try To Shut Down The "Why Files"
MarchingAnts writes: "According to this article on eSchoolNews.com, Fox lawyers are demanding that the University of Wisconsin close down its immensely popular science website "The Why Files" (which has been online for nearly five years) because it supposedly infriges on its trademark of "The X-Files" and could confuse viewers of the television show. An offer made by Fox to license "The Why Files" name to the University for an undisclosed fee has been rejected, and lawyers have now said they will start legal action seeking to cancel "The Why Files.""
It's a common mistake among /.ers to assume that what applies to one type of intellectual property law applies to all. Nothing could be further from the truth.
More generally, scientists and engineers often make the mistake of thinking that you can look at specific laws and make generalizations from them to similar cases. This works fine in science and engineering. It's what science is all about, in fact. But it's not how law works.
There are no general principles in law, only the specifics of individual laws. Oh, sure, the motivations of lawmakers may cause different laws to seem to be based on the same principle, but you can't extrapolate from one law to another.
More directly relavant to IP law, patents != trademarks != copyrights != patents.
To take one simple example, trademarks cannot be selectively enforced. If you let some people get away with infringing your trademark (and I'm talking here about bona fide trademark infringements, and not the bogus type seen here in the Fox vs. UW case), you may find that you no longer have a trademark, against your will.
People often try to extrapolate, and thus reason that patents and copyrights also cannot be selectively enforced, but this is not so. Patents and copyrights can and are selectively enforced, and the fact that you did not enforce your patent or copyright against one infringer does not weaken it in the least.
Why should selective enforcement be allowed for patents and copyrights, but not for trademarks? No reason, as far as I can tell. There are no general principles at work here, only specific laws, which allow for selective enforcement of patents and copyrights, but not trademarks. QED.
Sorry to ramble on for so long, but it's a common mistake on /.
Never take moderation advice from sigs, including this one.
Well, Fox wouldn't exist without the Simpsons. It would have tanked around 1990 but for that one show. I think the show does have the network by the short hairs (or used to).
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Didn't really need /. just to tell me Fox are a bunch of slimeballs. This has been common knowledge for the past, oh, decade...
;-P
Lord only knows how a good show like The Simpsons managed to stay on Fox for so long... IIRC they even had an episode blasting Fox the way they attack everything else... I guess Fox is just asleep at the switch, either that or their legions of Simpsons fans have them by the short hairs.
-Kasreyn
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger
It has been found that private actors (individuals and companies) using the courts become government actions.
It would be nice if they had posted the letters, but I would guess that they are using the dilution act. Given that, the claim must fail since it's not a commercial site. There is not even banner advertising.
Fight Spammers!
As long as i get my weekly dosis of The Simpsons i don't care, really.
keep it simple.
See the USPTO's page for information regarding the mark in question:
http://tess.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=70 1a4n.2.1
Give a man a fish, he owes you one fish. Teach a man to fish, collect recurring licensing revenue for life.