Trading on my (and maybe your) good name

[JPGinLA]

Hi,

I just discovered these 2 sites that are trading on my registered trademark:

http://www.gamelinkage.com/game/snood/

and

http://www.free-soft-downloads.com/free/snood/

There are other similar pages using games in the address. Maybe one of them is your property?

I have sent attorney-grams demanding the sites be removed and asking for an accounting - under the law, I'm entitled to damges - either statutory or actual profits.

I also cc'd Google as their ads are on the pages and I think they can help stop this and I'm entitled to their profits too.

Per whois, the sites are run by Terminal Studio, Sergey Stolbov, info@brickshooter.com
P.O.Box 360
Saint Petersburg, Saint Petersburg 197198

Anyone know this guy or studio?

I intend to stop this and all info is appreciated either here, by private message or email.

Thanks for any help and support!

-JPG

[Applewood]

What am I missing ? All I see on that page is a load of bust-a-move rip offs.

[joe]

Why not use your energy to write new games? :-)

What is this guy doing? I think it's no violation at your trademark. Otherwise a lot of portals would be in trouble. (for example Reflexive has a categorie called Breakout Games if I remember right, this also isn't a violation to the original trademark, isn't it?).

[Tom Cain]

I believe Google will remove an AdWord ad that contains a trademarked term if the trademark owner complains, but they will let an ad use a trademark as a search term as long as it doesn't appear in the text of the ad.

[SteveZ]

*I haven't tested this method, but what you could also do is find the hosting company of the party you're reaching and notify them of the infringement. This can help shutdown the website.

Domain servers for the website:
NS1.EV1SERVERS.NET 207.218.245.135
NS2.EV1SERVERS.NET 207.218.247.135

Not sure if you can link that nameserver to the host, but worth a shot!

-Steve Z.

[JPGinLA]

Thanks Steve - when I did whois for the nameservers I didn't get anything. Maybe I'm looking in the wrong place.

-JPG

[JPGinLA]

In case anyone cares, I succeeded in stopping the infringement.

:-)

-JPG

[arcadetown]

It would be petty helpful to show what you did to stop the infringement, threating emails, hosting complaint, legal action, etc.

Also, did it help to have a registered trademark? Some here have argued that doesn't help but I've sure found it to help with us.

[JPGinLA]

Glad to share.

Yes, IMO, it is helpful to have a registered trademark.

An attorney-gram was sent to everyone connected to the site in any manner demanding it be removed immediately and demanding an accounting within a short time period.

The letter also explained fact of the infringement, that we are entitled to cessation of the infringement and statutory or actual damages, and that none of our rights were being waived by the contents of the letter.

By sending to the letter to as many people as possible, the liklihood of communicating with someone subject to US law increased and also of communicating with someone knowlegable and reasonable was more likely.

The bottomline is that you need to be pro-active in policing your property and yes, using your trademark in a URL is infringement. Using trademarks in advertising descriptions can infringement too. The previous posters thinking there is no infringement are incorrect.

Hope this helps someone else.

-JPG

[sillytuna]

To follow up, I checked with one of our partners today as they have highly valued IP.

Apparently if you mentioned another game in your game summary, as I've seen frequently in the indie games world, you have to give due credit and use all relevant symbols (registered trademark etc).

If you are not doing this then you're acting illegally and can be asked to remove the reference.

Meanwhile, if you are passing off as another product or trading on their name in some way, then you are opening yourself up to being sued. Whether you'd win or lose is another matter.