Sites claim to be news for the 99%.
[Update: the naysayers in the comments were correct: The Tribune Company lost the case.] The Chicago Tribune Company has filed a complaint with World Intellectual Property Organization over “occupy” web sites using its brand.
The complaint targets occupiedchicagotribune.org and occupychicagotribune.org, the former of which is a web site that states “We’re proud to have no affiliation whatsoever with the 1% Chicago Tribune or the Tribune Co.”.
The site states:
The Occupied Chicago Tribune is an independent media source for those who do not see their struggles and views represented in the mainstream press. We created this paper to provide an outlet for reporting, commentary and analysis on the growing Occupy movement, its unique application in our city and the struggles of the 99%.
These “occupiers” are going to flip out even more against the man when they learn about trademark law.
The Occupied Chicago Tribune also links to similar sites, including Occupied Wall Street Journal and Occupied Oakland Tribune.
Rob says
this is an interesting one. stating the obvious – i am no trademark attorney, but i will put forward the following opinions:
“occupying” is now a global movement – you are effectively protesting about the way a particular government, organization, company, system, or whatever, does their business. you are permitted to register trademarksucks.com for the reasons of free speech and to protest about the actions/inactions of that group. rightfully so. so why wouldn’t occupy/ingtrademark.com fall under the same ruling?
in the above example of a media outlet, i see the protest is about the media NOT reporting about some very important and relevant commentary/information and to effectively expose the things the global media/financial/government cartels don’t want to tell us.
i would think that everyone who visits this site is smart enough to know that we are told almost nothing about what REALLY happens in this world. do you think the media play no part in this?
eg in australia do some research on the “questionable stuff” our prime minister has been allegedly linked to through an (ex?) boyfriend lawyer. visit kangaroocourtofaustralia.com. gee, funny how our mainstream media has not said a word!
i reckon it’s fair to get occupytrademark.com as long as it’s used in the right way. they obviously wanted it shut down before it was set up (and i won’t blame them for it) but maybe they jumped in a touch too early to have solid proof of infringement. sounds to me like “kill them financially”.
if it turns into a “david and goliath”, i vote for david.
PrintHead says
Your article implies that Occupy media folks need to know more on trademark law– but I’d say you need to bone up on the First Amendment. I’ve never seen a clearer case of protected speech than this kind of satire & political comment– Electronic Frontier Foundation would take this case in a heartbeat, & they’ll win.
Core says
I can’t see any free speech claim here (you could maybe claim that if these were protest sites against the Chicago Tribune, but they are not).
And trademarksucks.com domains don’t infringe on trademarks in the first place, nobody is going to think a blog called thechicagotribunesucks.com is actually a chicago tribune webpage.
Sue Basko says
This has to do with trademark law, regarding use of the words “Chicago Tribune.” Oddly — my search of the US trademark database shows the Chicago Tribune never bothered to register that name for a website. That’s probably why they are complaining to WIPO and not filing a trademark complaint — because they can’t file one.
Sue Basko says
ALSO Chicago Tribune has no hold over the word “Chicago” or the word “Tribune,” just the phrase “Chicago Tribune”, and it looks like they never bothered to register trademark on it as a website. There are dozens of news outlets using the word “Tribune” Can WIPO be used as a way around trademark law? Not that I know of.