It’s not ridiculous to allow the trademarking of common words. It’s not a blanket right that is granted - it’s the right to use that word in respect to a particular domain in which you are actively conducting business. For instance, “Apple” in the field of consumer electronics. Without this protection, you would have all sorts of second rate knockoff pseudo-Apple products in the market, and things would be a mess.
The problem comes in cases like this, where you have a company (or in this case, an individual) who is trolling in order to extort money from people trying to operate in areas where he is really doing nothing.
If someone here happens to own that film on DVD, I would very much like to know if the credits or cover text mentions this license. Did Fox’s lawyers really bow down to Langdell? Seriously?
As Royal quoted, it’s listed on the Edge Games website under “Crossover Movies / TV”.
For a while, there was a website at www.edgemagazine.co.uk (google cache) that talked about how Future and Edge had a deal for publishing the magazine. That site no longer exists, that page instead forwards straight through to edge online, the correct url for the magazine.
Does the IGDA actually do anything? I’ve been a member for ages, I think because of the GDC, and my impression is that no one in that organization has actually done anything in the games industry in decades.
And really, it depends where you are. The Boston Post Mortem (local IGDA chapter, but the name predates the IGDA, so we kept it) meets monthly. There’s networking and a talk about something, everything from IP issues from a local law firm to Randy Smith on game design.
Every once in awhile a local company will sponsor it and then we’ll get free beers instead of having to pay. It’s generally got attendance at around 200 people, and there are always announcements from companies who are hiring.
It is the most active chapter, and the best attended regular meetings. The Austin chapter gets bigger turnouts, but they only meet once or twice a year for big, company-sponsored events.
Agreed. Every once in awhile there’s a kerfuffle like the crediting on WAR, or Capps on crunch, and now this… and we see that the IGDA is actually impotent.
How is it that EA didn’t sue him over that “MIRRORS a new game from EDGE” bullshit? Do they wipe their asses with the Lanham Act instead of reading it?
Renowned UK development industry forum The Chaos Engine has come together to rally against notorious ‘trademark troll’ and current IGDA board member Tim Langdell.
The trademark-chasing nature of Langdell’s operation was once again brought under scrutiny after French independent developer Mobigame was forced to withdraw its award-winning iPhone game EDGE from Apple’s App Store. Langdell allegedly claimed that the game was an infringement on his trademark over the word Edge.
According to the forum, Mobigame - who own the trademark to the name ‘EDGE’ in France - offered to rename the game to EDGY in other markets, but Langdell apparently refused and then subsequently applied for the ‘EDGY’ trademark in the US.
The Chaos Engine and its 7,000-strong membership have gone as far as to establish a fund to aid Mobigame in what could be a long legal dispute.
“We think it’s important that Langdell not be allowed to bludgeon small companies with esoteric trademark laws,” said Paddy Sinclair, CEO of Proper Games.
Eurogamer has spent some time talking to both parties over this story:
Langdell doesn’t come off well, seemingly pretending not to be himself in emails and then lying about his own behaviour.
There should be some kind of provision that a trademark not be vaild if not actually used proactively by a buisness. Currently ‘EDGE Games’ appears to be a buisness sustaini9ng itself solely on suing other people who use ‘EDGE’ for any entertainment purpose.
If it was a neologism invented by Mr. Langdell or his company was actively creating new widely known games then mayhaps he might have a case. As it is he comes across as a bully with a trademark that is hugely over extended.
Isn’t there? I thought the reason he sold branded jackets or coffee mugs or whatever was to keep up the guise of use. Plus the people silly enough to license the word from him sometimes end up branding their product with his company name.
Derek at TIGSource posted this on their forums yesterday. Apparently Tim Langdell had a restraining order filed against him in 2006 for stalking an actress. I thought it another little interesting bit to the ongoing story.
