Hello Nathan Collier

All of this stuff reminds me of the VWOA crap going on where VW is having their lawyers contact people who are doing as little as just displaying a VW logo on their non-profit website and telling them to remove it. Sounds like someone needs to clean house at VWOA and Jeep in the PR departments. Ridiculous.

On 16 Dec 2003 15:54:25 -0800, snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com (Jason Williams) shared the following:

-- Travis

In Germany there is no "freedom of speech" such as we have here. Both DC and VW are German owned and managed. Perhaps those two things are related?

I d> All of this stuff reminds me of the VWOA crap going on where VW is

Knowing what you obviously already knew, how could you have expected anything else from D-C?

---------------------------------------------------- Del Rawlins- del@_kills_spammers_rawlinsbrothers.org Remove _kills_spammers_ to reply via email. Unofficial Bearhawk FAQ website:

jason, ouch. 3 to 1 we see "jeeples" used by daimler in the near future. sorry to hear about your run in....sorry to see them yet again biting the hand that feeds them. if youd care to compare notes, contact me at

Do any of you understand intellectual property rights and copyright law?

Tirya

intellectual property is a new frontier thats only beginning to be explored. there is very little existing case law on it because people like me fold and settle rather than risk everything fighting a corporate giant.

The "Jeeples" name is not exact and if it's a "coined" name, something you made up, you still have a chance. It sounds coined to me and therefore it is not two words but one. This means you have a chance and it is not exact but different. The only problem would be that you would be promoting their product on clothes therefore you are interfering with their mark and all would be lost.

Tirya did pass the time by typing:

Some do, some don't.

FWIW, two companies can have a trademark on the same name providing there is no confusion to the consumer.

Take for example Pinto. Someone could sell Pinto brand beans and not the Pinto automobile. (yea.. poor example but you see the point) Can't drive a bean and can't eat an automobile.

There are several situations in case law. McDonalds is one. They tried to lay claim to any Mc labeled restaurant including McChina and a McDonald's restaurant owned and operated by someone oddly enough named McDonald. The last one failed, don't know about the McChina, but it's out on google.

In this case however, Jeep has a line of licensed goods including a real crappy radio and other branded stuff. The best non-lawyer suggestion I can give is ask what the license fee is for the Jeep trademark or get a good lawyer cause it's not gonna be pretty.

Why not offer to sell them the trademark and concepts for a couple mil?

Guys, Jeep _has_ to protect its trademark, even in stupid, inconsequential cases or they will lose it entirely.

Yes, you are just little guys, but to the law you're no different than Ford or GM. If Jeep lets you use it, then they lose it.

You could always call the clothing line something along the lines of SevenSlots, but I can see where that could have at least a couple meanings not politically correct. Which of course could make it an instant best seller amongst upperteens and twenty-somethings.

-- Fan of the dumbest team in America.

The classic example is Apple. It is both a computer company and a record label founded by a certain four lads (now 2) from Liverpool. The record company tried, unsuccessfully to sue the computer company some years ago. The courts decided that the public could tell the difference.

Regards,

DAve

Oh! Good luck to Jason!

Unless he's willing to go to court and fight he may as well just dump it now and move on. At some point what DC does will require a response from him or he will lose by default. And contrary, DC no doubt has a warehouse full of lawyers on staff 24/7. It's not as if they have to go out and hire the counsel. Unless he's willing to fight he's already lost. Even if he IS willing to fight, from what I can see just from what he's posted, DC has a point and he IS trying to capitalize off of the Jeep name.

Thank goodness they stopped you, someone could have thought you were Daimler Chrysler.

I remember when IBM sued for the name "big blue". The was a little winery in New York call Big Blue winery... They also sued for anyone who use the "bared" letters like IBM uses in their logo.

I have to disagree with you there, Nathan. Intellectual property law covers copyrights, trademarks and patents and is a well-established branch of commercial law. The Internet has made it very easy to circumvent many intellectual property constraints (witness p2p file sharing) and that is what is being explored right now.

• * * Matt Macchiarolo
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nothing has really been challenged yet which is why there are so few attorneys who specialize in intellectual property, and its why those who do charge so much. theres a ton of good information concerning intellectual property at

Many IP attorneys don't work for law firms, they work for the corporations that need their services. I personally know 2 IP attorneys that work for Big Three OEM suppliers. Other examples would be attorneys who work for publishers or record labels that specialize in copyright law. I'd guess that there or more such specialists that work for these kinds of companies than work independently.

The Internet technology has made IP violations so widespread that the law hasn't had a chance to catch up or adapt, and that's why I'd agree that there have been few IP challenges in regards to how IP laws apply *online.*

But there are reams of real-world caselaw involving intellectual property rights.

• * * Matt Macchiarolo
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