All posts by: Adam Garson

Real Trademarks Used in Virtual Worlds – Part II In our June 2009 newsletter, we wrote about the challenges posed by Virtual Worlds such as Second Life to trademark owners.  The commercialization of virtual worlds by real life companies and the apparently rampant unauthorized use of trademarks by virtual world residents has created new “territory” […]

By now, anybody in the know who uses Facebook, is scrambling (or has scrambled) to get their own vanity user name. On Saturday, June 13, 2009, Facebook opened the door for an estimated 200 million users to select any “username” they wanted virtually without limitation.  The benefit is to have a URL which reads “Facebook.com/UserName,” […]

Real Trademarks Used in Virtual Worlds, Second Life In a lawsuit filed in April 2009, Taser International, Inc.,  the world’s largest maker of stun guns sued Linden Research Inc. (“Linden Lab”), the San Francisco based company, which runs Second Life, the online virtual world.  Taser Int’l, Inc. v. Linden Research, Inc., 2:09-cf-00811-ROS (D. Az 2009). […]

Lawyers often talk about the benefits of federal trademark registration.  Federal registration bestows upon the trademark owner the ability to bring infringement actions in federal court, it provides evidentiary presumptions about use and validity of the mark, it bestows a presumption of incontestability (after 5 years), it provides constructive notice that the mark is yours, […]