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Pixar Trademark Lawyers Being Kept Busy: Fighting Pixar Petroleum, While Being Fought By The Atlanta Braves Over 'Brave'
from the brave-pixar dept
It appears that Disney's Pixar division is engaged in two separate, but interesting, trademark battles (though the two are quite different). The first involves a Canadian oil company that decided to call its new division Pixar Petroleum. Turns out that Pixar isn't happy about that and is taking legal action. One of the points raised is that Pixar chief John Lasseter is a big proponent of alternative fuels and may not like any association with an oil company. Of course, that alone doesn't make for a reasonable trademark claim. In fact, I'm wondering if there is a reasonable trademark claim here at all. Trademarks cover the specific industries in which you use the mark in commerce, and despite movies like Cars, it seems like a pretty big reach to suggest that digital animation studio Pixar is in the same industry as oil producing Pixar. While it might cause a doubletake, I'm not sure that any of your traditional morons in a hurry would actually think that the characters from Toys were setting up oil refineries in Canada.
In this second dispute, Pixar finds itself on the other side of the coin. The major league baseball team, the Atlanta Braves, are apparently trying to dispute Pixar's attempt to register Brave as a trademark. Pixar wants the name because it's releasing a movie with that name. Of course, the baseball team doesn't actually hold a registered trademark on just "Brave." Instead its registered marks are on the plural version. This doesn't entirely exclude their protest, as they can argue a common law trademark or a likelihood of confusion.
Either way, I'm at a loss as to where the confusion would be here as well. I don't see anyone going to see the Pixar movie and then being disappointed that it wasn't a baseball game.
In this second dispute, Pixar finds itself on the other side of the coin. The major league baseball team, the Atlanta Braves, are apparently trying to dispute Pixar's attempt to register Brave as a trademark. Pixar wants the name because it's releasing a movie with that name. Of course, the baseball team doesn't actually hold a registered trademark on just "Brave." Instead its registered marks are on the plural version. This doesn't entirely exclude their protest, as they can argue a common law trademark or a likelihood of confusion.
Either way, I'm at a loss as to where the confusion would be here as well. I don't see anyone going to see the Pixar movie and then being disappointed that it wasn't a baseball game.
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Reader Comments (rss)
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Marvel Comics tried to stop Marvel Mystery Oil and failed. Since the two companies had NO competing products, there was no trademark confusion!
Same thing here.
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Or something like that.
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They're also not going to win the one regarding the Atlanta Braves either. Have you seen the trailer for the Brave movie? Pretty sure I didn't see an Indian or game of Baseball there.
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Violet™
Apple™
This™is™getting™ridiculous,™soo n™there™will™be™no™more™words™for™common™use&t rade;:)
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Base Ball
I can see someone going to a baseball game and being disappointed they didn't go to a Pixar movie instead. Maybe that is what they are afraid of.
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"marvel" (as mentioned above) is a generic english word, why would that be protected. but "pixar" is not. it's specifically the name of a company and nothing else. i think pixar has a case here.
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Brave?
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Re: Brave?
Isn't that what copyright is for? To make movies less transient and more...forever?
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Oh, wait. Nah, I have more productive and fun things to do, like coding. *Sigh*
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Now back to work, seriously. I promise. HA.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daewoo
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Dilution?
Dilution is likely the best claim for the Atlanta Braves, but until this lawsuit, I never made the association. I associate "Brave" with the definition for "brave." It's not a strong fanciful mark like "Pixar." Then again, I know little about how dilution factors into oppositions.
So yes, I criticizing the article's writer for clearly limited grasp on TM law. Dilution dilution dilution.
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Pixar's working title for Brave was "The Bear and the Bow." Maybe they should've kept it?
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I have to admit, though that it's amusing to think of someone doing that. "Can I get $50 of Pixar Supreme and a copy of Cars by paying at the pump?"
As for the Brave vs Braves silliness it's much the same thing. Just how do you confuse a movie title with a baseball team? Indeed one of the most successful teams in MLB.
At a really big stretch I can see the team believing that somehow the trade mark on the movie name could damage them should the movie tank. (Pixar might be due for one of those, after all.) Or that they're linked in some way. Maybe Disney needs to buck up for product placement or something!
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Re: Brave?
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Home Of the Free?
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Re: Dilution?
...except maybe a guy with the last name "McDonald"? :)
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Marvel Oil/Turtle Wax could have probably had this thrown out simply based on prior use of the name.
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I call it the micro-soft pillow
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Re: Re: Dilution?
Yes, I'm humorless. :P
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Connect the dots....
Film is created from Petroleum (among other things).
Pixar Petroleum processes petroleum and decides to create film as one of it's sub-divisions.
Film created from Pixar Petroleum's sub-division, could be sold as "A Pixar Film"...
BaDaBing...BaDaBoom...
Even a Moron in a Hurry could be confused into buying a canister of blank "Pixar Film" thinking that they were actually buying a movie from Pixar Studios....
Oh, everything's digital these days, guess this application of the 'Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon Methodology' doesn't hold water....
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Horrible.
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