Here's another example of an outrageous intellectual property lawsuit. Major League Baseball is suing a fantasy sports league for using baseball players' names and statistics without licensing them.
The courts have already ruled that player information is in the public domain. It's printed in the newspapers every day.
What a greedy money-grubbing industry. As if baeball isn't already making enough money, with the help of publicly subsidized stadiums,
OK, now this time I go with you.
I think, in the case of the major league, there is probably a red face and a sore bum or three because they did not get in first... as they should have, considering that similar "games" have been running in NZ, Australia and Britain for some three or four years.
You don't register names or anything silly like that - you register the "game".
BUT...
The registration of names and generics is quite something else from our previous discussion.
I approached the topic from this angle -
http://probligo.blogspot.com/2006/02/cultural-property.html
Now don't get upset because that example includes a singer and the use of Maori cultural identifiers on Israeli cigarettes among other things.
The most amazing comes not from US but Germany where the name "Moana" has been registered over a wide range of products, including CD's.
Now if your name happens to be "Moana", and you use your name as a stage name as well, and you want to give a concert in Germany...
Very sorry, you have to change your name!
Posted by: probligo | May 17, 2006 at 12:55 AM
Yeah, I also get mad when companies register a name and then tell people who legitimately had the name before that they can no longer use their own name. Outrageous.
Posted by: Half Sigma | May 17, 2006 at 09:41 AM