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Topic: Atari Bankrupt (Read 2402 times)
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Anthony
*Smell* controller
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Posts: 358
Star Control Lives!
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Ever since the release of Jenga World Tour for the Wii/DS, people have suspected Atari's financial difficulties.
Yes, they still own the Star Control trademark. Although, when Star Control 1 & 2 was released on GOG, Atari still owned the trademark. Does that count as a "use"?
THQ filed for bankruptcy too. The video game politics can be mind boggling at times.
If they're willing to sell the rights of Pong and Missile Command, I'm sure they'd be willing to sell the Star Control trademark. It's really up to them and whether or not they can negotiate a fair price. It would be really awesome of TFB could get it. They'd finally be able to make a proper Star Control game and use the name. The next challenge would be to convince Activision to publish it.
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« Last Edit: January 21, 2013, 09:21:52 pm by Anthony »
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Elestan
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Posts: 431
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I seem to recall reading something about a half-assed, bullshit Star Control game they were working on a couple of years ago. It got "put on the back burner" pretty quickly, and was obviously just some bureaucratic mind game to claim they were still "actively using" the trademark.
Yeah, I remember that thread (/index.php?topic=4044), and actually did some research on trademark law when it happened. From what I can tell, that flash game probably wouldn't have held up as proof of use if anyone were to have challenged the trademark; it would have been a fairly clear case of "token use" (search "trademark" "token use" for details).
Until they put the game on GoG, I would have been willing to bet money that someone could have successfully re-registered "Star Control" and taken the trademark away from them; it only takes three years of non-use before the burden of proof reverses, so they'd have had to prove they were still using it instead of the other way around. I don't know whether resuming use of the mark after the three years is up serves to "cure" the abandonment; that'd be a question for an IP lawyer. But I suspect that it would at least be quite expensive to try to test the question in court.
Of course, if the Chapter 11 bankruptcy fails and converts to a Chapter 7, then all their assets go up for auction...
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« Last Edit: January 22, 2013, 06:43:51 am by Elestan »
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Elestan
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Posts: 431
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I wonder whether GoG has actually gotten permission from Atari to use the trademark. After all, they originally did not even ask TFB for permission, IIRC. (But maybe that was because they thought they got everything they needed from Atari.)
Without permission, there is still no "use" by Atari. Unfortunately, there's no easy way to test this without a lot of expensive lawyer time. Pre-GoG, it looked pretty cut and dry, and could probably have been decided out of court by the patent office alone.
And if Atari does go belly-up, the trademark would be a nice anniversary present to TFB. With a caution to not let it lapse, of course.  |
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