I'm curious about the usefulnees of trademarks in scieince fiction writing, and any merchandising or marketing connected with it
Having grown up with 'Star Wars' and 'Star Trek', I've seen the huge merchandising potential for this genre. But what if you don't have a billion-dollar movie-and-TV franchise, and you're just putting stories and novels?
How important is it to trademark your work?
Quote:
Trademark - Definition from Microsoft's Encarta96 Encyclopedia
Trademark,any symbol, such as a word, number, picture, or design, used by manufacturers or merchants to identify their own goods and distinguish them from goods made or sold by others. Thus, a trademark identifies the source of a product and fixes responsibility for its quality. If customers like the goods, the trademark enables them to know what to purchase in the future; if they dislike the product, they will avoid goods with that trademark. The name of a type of product cannot be a trademark, because every maker of that product is free to use its name. Sony, for example, is a well-known trademark for televisions, radios, and audio equipment, but no one can have trademark rights to the word television or radio. On several occasions, however, words intended by manufacturers to be used as trademarks for new products were instead used by customers to name the products; such words then lost their legal status as trademarks. Examples include aspirin, cellophane, and escalator. |