[_] Trademarks
Matt Hamilton
matth at netsight.co.uk
Wed Dec 30 20:07:37 GMT 2009
On 30 Dec 2009, at 10:13, Thomas Buckley-Houston wrote: > Ho there, > > Can anyone give me the lowdown on trademarking a web application? How > important is it? Also seeing as the internet is essentially > international > territory do I have to register a trademark in every major country? You have to register it in every country you want protection in. I think there is now an EU-wide registration now available, but I'm also sure there are a lot of near-scam-like services out there that offer to register it all over the place for some very low fee. Be wary. I had some involvement in some trademark disputes with regards to the trademark registration for Zope internationally, and I do know that something in the region of €25-35K was spent on trademark specialist fees. So just be aware it may be more expensive than you think as each and every country has its own registration processes. One thing also, is that (at least in the US and the UK) you need to actively defend the trademark, otherwise you will have a hard time if you end up in a dispute. This means that you will want to get together a set of usage guidelines for your mark/logo and you will need to be prepared to actively chase those that are abusing your trademark if you find any. -Matt -- Matt Hamilton matth at netsight.co.uk Netsight Internet Solutions, Ltd. Understand. Develop. Deliver http://www.netsight.co.uk +44 (0)117 9090901 Web Design | Zope/Plone Development & Consulting | Co-location | Hosting