Policy about trademarks

[Guido Falsi]

On Tue, Dec 02, 2008 at 12:05:11PM +0100, Richard Hartmann wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 11:16, Josef Spillner <josef at ggzgamingzone.org> wrote:
> 
> > Independent of the procedure, it would be beneficial to have accompanying
> > documents and links to relevant trademark rules and databases. There surely
> > must be a possibility to query trademarks, servicemarks, patternmarks and
> > related minefields all across the world. The distros whose policy is strict
> > about them probably already have such material.
> 
> I was about to ask the same.

> PS: Totally off topic for this list, but with the discussion at hand,
> I will risk it:
> Does anyone know the costs involved in registering a world-wide trademark
> and how to go about this? The entity which does the registering is based in
> the UK. If yes, please reply off-list.

For what I know trademarks are regulated by states. No global body.
There are some bilateral or multilateal agreements, but not as wide
as for copyright. Some nations give trademarks for free but you
have to fight yourself in court for them, others have you pay and
give some assistance. Some even don't have any rule about trademarks.

I think you'd have to apply in every nation you're interested in. Some
require you actually use the trademark in some manner or it will
"decay".

wikipedia seems to have some good information, but not guaranteed to be
correct.

-- 
Guido Falsi <mad at madpilot.net>