Ask HN: Should we file a trademark?

#1

Post by secretagent » Tue, Sep 22, 2015, 4:35 PM UTC

We're CodePen. We've been operating for 3+ years. A google search for our name yields 518k legit results. We've always operated under the assumption that we're the de-facto owner of our name. But, recently, someone used our icon which was included in a free icon set as the icon for their magazine.

We're looking into paying to trademark our company, but it seems kinda pricy and also seems to have little value. In fact, [LegalZoom] [1] says "you are not required to register a trademark to achieve some level of protection".

Can anyone here explain to me what we'll really get from going through this $900 process?

[1]: https://www.legalzoom.com/knowledge/trademark/faq/benefits-registered-trademarks

Re: Ask HN: Should we file a trademark?

#2

Post by dalke » Tue, Sep 22, 2015, 4:59 PM UTC

LegalZoom also talks about unregistered trademarks (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unregistered_trademark) and the comparison with registered trademarks at http://info.legalzoom.com/registered-vs-unregistered-tradema... and http://info.legalzoom.com/report-use-unregistered-trademark-... .

You first send a cease and desist letter.

> If the infringing party does not comply with your cease and desist letter, you may protect your unregistered mark by filing a lawsuit for trademark infringement in your state court. Your lawsuit will need to notify the court how long you've been using the mark and how the other party is infringing on your rights. Because an unregistered trademark is only granted protection within a limited geographic area, any infringing use outside of this geographic area will not be enforceable. A third party who files for federal registration of your unregistered mark, even after you've been using it, may be granted the right to use that mark in all geographic areas other than the limited area where your common law rights exist.

Re: Ask HN: Should we file a trademark?

#3

Post by sjs382 » Tue, Sep 22, 2015, 6:18 PM UTC

Yeah, getting your logo used in unexpected places is one of the major downsides of having your logo included in icon packs.

Before I changed it, one codebase I had inherited used the Pagelines (had never heard of this product before seeing it in the FontAwesome logos section) logo [1] as an icon on a webpage.

[1] http://fontawesome.io/icon/pagelines/