Zynga Tries To Trademark 'Ville'
from the there-go-my-plans-for-faceville dept
Back in January, we wrote about Zynga -- who had a reputation for copying the games of lots of other companies, including a blatant copying of the name "Mafia Wars" from another gamemaker (for which Zynga just settled a lawsuit) -- and was now becoming quite the trademark bully itself, specifically going after Blingville, for daring to use the suffix "ville." Zynga has no registered trademark on "ville" (though, in trademark law, you do not necessarily need a registered mark, and can quite frequently get by with a common law mark), but the folks over at Fusible have noticed that Zynga has recently filed for the trademark on "ville" in Europe. The application is to cover three different classifications, including for online computer and electronic games (of course). Once again, this seems pretty extreme. The suffix "ville" is hardly unique to Zynga, and it shouldn't be allowed to monopolize it like this. Hopefully the application is rejected.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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from the there-go-my-plans-for-faceville dept
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Re: from the there-go-my-plans-for-faceville dept
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Re: Re: from the there-go-my-plans-for-faceville dept
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Re: Re: Re: from the there-go-my-plans-for-faceville dept
Oh, and Mike is liable as a third party for not preventing you from posting it also.
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so many villes
"Your honor, this municipality is unfairly using our client's trademarked 'ville' in their name, causing them irreparable harm."
"The city has been there for 200 years, your client has only had the trademark for 2 years."
"But..but trademark."
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Re:
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ville
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Ville
Ville du Quebec is about 400 years old
Ville du Montreal is about 375 y/o
Boucherville the town is about 300 y/o
The street Boucherville is the kid on the block at 225 y/o
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Re: Ville
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As I Understand It ...
I remember this came up a few decades ago, when (later-absorbed-by-Compaq-which-was-in-turn-absorbed-by-HP) Digital Equipment Corporation made various models of computer terminals named the VT52, VT100, VT220 and so on, and tried to trademark that “VT” prefix. They couldn’t.
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Attention please
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These Zynga Ville- ains...
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If only my parents understood trademark...
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Certainly he could've made some snide remark about FUDville, talk about a slacker.
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Good luck with that
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Bah.
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Townsville
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Townsville,+Quee nsland,+Australia&aq=0&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=29.716225,86.572266&ie=UTF8&h q=&hnear=Townsville+Queensland,+Australia&ll=-19.257998,146.818542&spn=0.138071,0.338173 &z=12
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Margaritaville
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