@Knyte (funny enough, I guessed your new nickname before checking it, you're one of a kind ;-))

Following your 6/4/2021 20:38:30 post

In your dispatch of your undergraduate legal course, you mention nothing about being first to use a name, which in US law seems to be the basics and is apparently enough to own the right to be alone to use that name or at least, ask for no infringement from anyone else using that name after you started to.
By infringements, we can easily see them, Pinky sumed them up (Google search, Twitch vids, WZ customer service). These were not happening before Activision use of this name, and wouldn't have had Activision chosen any other name.

Also, you're saying Activision has done no wrongdoing. But what if Activision did a thorough research about the name (would that be surprising from such a big company, with so much at stakes ?), and found out that Warzone was used a lot, and marketing team said : hey, let's just use this name, nobody would be allowed to complain, and with a global expensive investment in marketing, we'll gather attention from anybody trying to play any "Warzone" related game, after a friend told them about playing it, even when they were not talking about COD. This is kind of a way to steal marketing efforts of all small company having Warzone in their name, a bit like in your Coca-Cola example (well not exactly, the related point is about stealing marketing effort from someone else).

Say you invite a friend to meet you on Warzone to play it online with you, the "source" (Fizzer's game) has a good chance to be confused with COD game. That's infringement and what your line "trademark law is about protecting source identifiers and making sure consumers aren't confused about the source of a product" seems to actually be defending.

Also, I don't think we fall in the Dove example, because in my above example again, inviting a friend to play Warzone with you is already confusing, despite not being a video game played on a console. So the scope should be "online game", not specifically "video game" or "PS4 game". And both COD and WZ as we know it are online games.

Also, this would mean that one could come after everybody on a brand, use it, and buy the global recognition for the word with expensive marketing investment, including paid SEO (how else would warzone.com appear so down) and TV spots, benefit from efforts made so far from all related small business, and basically kill those indie games.

Also, you're saying "Warzone" is not specific enough to be branded. So neither is "Black ops" then ? Are we allowed to create a game called "Black ops" and hopefully attract COD players ? That would be cheap marketing if allowed.

Also, you say "Warzone" is a common english word. For me Warzone is the contraction of 2 common english words, war and zone. Of course in URLs most words are contracted (using dashes would look ugly) but on a legal view, this word does not seem so common and this way contracted makes it quite unique IMO. I mean, I'm looking for a translation of "warzone", I can't even find it https://dictionnaire.reverso.net/anglais-francais/warzone. Edit : just seen Fizzer mentionned this after your post.

I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just raising points where I would appreciate clarification.

Edited 6/9/2021 12:13:15

Good catch on first-to-use vs. first-to-file. If you're on the Discord, there's more details there in #activision-vs-wz that answer pretty much all of your remarks (including the question of "is warzone a word?" - there's a good amount of historical usage of it, and I think putting it all together "warzone" is a dictionary word as an alternate spelling of "war zone" and has a long history of usage, as you can find by doing a news search). I am aware of the US being first-to-use, I have mentioned it before several times (when people freaked out about Activision filing first), and I just didn't think it was relevant to the latest discussion, partly cause I figured everyone understood that Warzone would have priority from that angle if a jury determines the mark to be suggestive.

(There is some more damning errata: I misused the term "suggestive"; suggestive trademarks are inherently distinctive. Therefore, what I meant conceptually was that some trademarks require so few logical leaps to jump to the product that they are descriptive, not some special case of suggestive.)

As far as the rest of it goes, really, most of this sort of stuff tends to get decided by a jury, the finder of fact. So we'll have to see where they go- in terms of the factors for likelihood of confusion, etc. I think there's a realistic chance that Warzone gets some sort of stronger intellectual property rights out of this but a much smaller one that they are able to get a big payday from Activision. We'll see!

In 1998, the USPTO did grant a "Warzone" trademark to a video game company that sold CDs of a game named "Warzone" (or "WarZone"). That mark expired in 2005. So there's not that bad a chance that the USPTO grants some sort of "Warzone" trademark. I'm quite skeptical, though, that they grant anything close to enough damages from Activision to Warzone.com, LLC, such that Warzone.com, LLC, comes out net ahead (minus legal fees) relative to where they would've gotten if they'd just found a settlement during the months of negotiation after sending the cease and desist.

My main motive at this point is to try and figure out what Warzone.com, LLC's actual motive is (I'd worked with the belief that it was to protect their apps and business from Activision abusing a trademark to shut them down), and to understand exactly why we were told what we were told about the cease and desist. Hopefully we can square that all with a world where Warzone.com, LLC, is in the right, although I'm admittedly quite skeptical and can't help but see this as just another interaction involving manipulation and dishonesty (or at least secrets) from the site admin.

Edited 6/9/2021 16:28:03

Good post, l4v.r0v, except that virtually none of these cases - except those between giants like Apple and Samsung or Google - ever go to a jury. They are settled or decided by the judge long before that. This one should be no different.

Looks like, after 300+ pages of posts, my conclusion remains the same. Fizzer should just go back to using Warlight.

If I am Fizzer, I don't switch to Warlight unless they give him a truckload of money first.

C.R.E.A.M.

The must have been deadline for Warzone response to claim. Are documents available online somewhere? Sorry, not American, not familiar :(

Fizzer: lies to the community

the community:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MC9AjN5l4Gs

Edited 6/21/2021 10:38:38

Hi everyone!

Have you thought about memes? Companies don't care about money, but viral reputation hits might hurt them a lot more than a lawsuit. And it might draw attention to this underdog story, and bring more people to help on gofundme...

I'm thinking along the line of the "show me the real/perfection" Magneto meme, with the first panel being an IRL warzone, the second panel Activision's game, and the third (perfection) our beloved Warzone game.

Here's the link to the meme on KnowYourMeme: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/perfection

Do you think it's a good idea?

Does any of you have enough Reddit/9gag/imgur/wherever memes are born cred to push it?

memes R great! :)

This is arguably irrelevant and I'd hate to he the one to say this, but this game's former name was unique and that meant it didn't carry even close to the same risk of such burdensome circumstances arising that Warzone carried. But that followed a positive growth trend so I probably have little to no room to complain.

I agree with people like Moosehead who've expressed that they could be suing you to intimidate. This isn't a new practice for masive predatory companies who like to take advantage of their dominant status as a pretense to bully smaller companies with obnoxious frivolous lawsuits.

This is what I can't stand about lawsuit culture.

Hello all! This is a very nice thread however, there is one qualm that I do have concerning all of this that is long overdue.

Whenever I go to warzone.com and look at the front page I see in blue letters 'Activision is suing us!' Of course, this may make sense to all of you, but my eyes do not work as well as they used to and I inadvertently end up reading the words 'Activision is acting sus!'

I find this sort of tomfoolery highly problematic. Not only is the warzone community a highly prestigious community in which enjoyment is handled in a professional manner, warzone has nothing to do with Activision(trademark)!

To make matters even worse, this inappropriate quip has managed to find its way to the front page of this website nearly every day for the past four months. I'm beginning to lose my patience as I gloss over the same four words every time.

Activision is acting sus!

@Slate: Just add this to your AdBlock filters and it'll go away:

www.warzone.com###HomeSection > div:nth-of-type(4)

Edited 7/4/2021 05:10:46

This is my first post in this thread, but I want to say something. When you look up "Warzone", the screen floods with COD links. Make of this what you want, but I felt this was worth saying.

Any updates?

On PACER: The motion to appear pro hac vice was granted on July 6, 2021 (https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/pro_hac_vice). It means that Brett E. Lewis (https://ilawco.com/attorneys/brett) can represent the defendant in the United States District Court for the Central District of California even though he is in NY, without committing unauthorized practice of law. (This is just a merely procedural thing; the case is federal so it's not like it's being governed by California state law.)

Otherwise the only recent activity has been the deadline extension (on 06/21) to allow Activision more time to respond since they're in the middle of settlement negotiations with Warzone.com, LLC.

i would be happy with a settlement for us to go back to warlight. it's been terrible since COD:W was announced and all Google results went to that

The fact that it went back to settlement discussions is interesting.. and a positive note for us..

I think that's just how it works. Legal proceedings are expensive so even once you've started you probably don't wanna go all the way.

I dont know why u called the game from WarLight into Warzone and finally into Warzone Idle later.
Why not using the first name only?

But I agree if u say u are the "owner" in some kinds of view of that name. 2017 was before Activisions games. Maybe they think u made it later... I dont know why you need money now, u alreay ARE the owner. Why u need money to defend something that is already yours? What kind of world are we living in?

For the worst case - just call it back to WarLight. I liked the name rly much in the past and i couldnt understand in 2017 why u renamed it.

Ok, friendly greets from germany so far. May the name be with you.

To be honest I liked 'warlight' brand better but that is ridiculous. I think you can turn it into an opportunity to get a lot of positive publicity especially that activision blizzard rather do not have very good PR, maybe the only more disliked game company is EA. It may be pretty stressful though. Good luck!