Jul 30 2007
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The Acronym “UFO” Is Now Copyrighted
Mike Coletta, over at UFO Geek’s Blog, reports receipt of a cease-and-desist letter from a lawyer for UFO Magazine. They claim that they have registered the term with the US Patent and Trademark Office and that no one else is allowed to use it as a trademark. The trouble is that over 20 other entities or companies have also registered the letters “UFO” as well (here on the US patent and trademark site, click “trademarks/ search TM database (TESS)”) Is the magazine going to sue them all? Are we going to get a letter at UFOmystic too?
What a circus.
Update: I thought that the site was called “UFO Geek’s blog.” Looks like the site is actually “UFO Magazine.net” and the blog has a different title. Perhaps the print publication is upset about that. Still, their letter emphasizes that they have copyrighted the term “UFO” and not the phrase “UFO Magazine.”
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July 30th, 2007 at 4:47 am
Quick, Greg, get and copyright UAP
Seems odd that such a well worn acronym can be copyrighted. No wonder the media won’t report them! Yes, this must be the true reason… nothing to do with the CIA
Didn’t Rupppelt come up with this in the 50’s?
July 30th, 2007 at 5:21 am
I’d guess that the real problem here is that his blog is titled ‘UFO Magazine’, and that’s what they don’t like. But they only have a trademark claim on the ‘UFO’ bit, so that’s all they can mention in the letter.
Kind regards,
Greg
July 30th, 2007 at 9:09 am
I’m thinking it’s the term “UFO Magazine” that is the issue, not UFO itself.
July 30th, 2007 at 11:02 am
All:
See update above.
July 30th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
Guess you guys are still on time to register the copyrights for “UAP” (Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon) and make loads of cash. Because apparently, that’s the only interest why sites like the one depicted in your article are into the UFO phenomenon: to make a buck.
July 30th, 2007 at 3:49 pm
red pill,
There’s nothing wrong with making a buck, but there’s also a point you have to watch where the buck is more important than the ideas you’re trying to communicate, or at least report about. That’s why I like reading blogs and other independent sources - to balance out the blatantly commercial stuff.
July 30th, 2007 at 5:55 pm
Sounds like they need to find a better lawyer or give their lawyer something better to do with their time. How can UFO Magazine successfully sue UFO Geek’s Blog when the copyright can only be for the full name, not part of a name? Also, UFO is an acronym that has been in use (ie — copyrighted as far as US law is concerned) long before UFO Magazine laid claim to it. Is the CIA behind this nonsense like they were with their grocery store tabloid idea?
July 30th, 2007 at 11:37 pm
Fuck those guys at UFO Magazine, I came up with that term years ago. I’ll see their asses in court.
July 31st, 2007 at 4:00 am
Just to make it clear, we are talking about UFO Magazine, not microsoft. They really aren’t a big corporate giant. As far as I know, it is just Nancy Birnes working her butt off and putting together the magazine every month.
Another tidbit, I discovered that copyrights are like patents, you are obligated to enforce them or you will lose them. In ufo magazine’s case I am not sure what means because only the ufo part is copyrighted. However, I honestly do not feel they are trying to attack ufo geek. I think they feel that due to the copyright laws, they have no choice.
July 31st, 2007 at 5:32 am
Got me a _cracker-jack_ idea.
I bought-up the domain names “Earthfiles.net,” “Coast2Coast.org,” and “Rense.us” and I’m running a mash-up of paranormal foo-feraw I procure from others and don’t properly attribute (rather like Victor Martinez) so as to capitalize on the traffic these sites generate and draw the spill-over back to _me_. Pretty slick, huh?
These sights I allude to shouldn’t miss the few thousand hits to their pages in the first place, I’m just a not-for-profit “hobby-site” in the second, and in the third? Well, think of the free publicity I can generate for myself if any of these trespassed entities _do_ squawk! I can play the part of stepped on little guy railroaded by the well-moneyed corporate big shots! You can’t _pay_ for publicity like that. Seems like a short-cut to the big vein of notoriety for me!
What?
Unethical you say? Unprincipled? Immoral? Unscrupulous? Dishonorable? Disreputable? …Wrong?
Well, all this and more happened over the weekend, reader. Bill and Nancy Birnes, owners of the one and only “UFO Magazine” are being stepped on in a similar fashion. Their investment, integrity, and property, as considered by one Mike Coletta (ufogeek.com) are without legitimacy and beneath the remotest respect.
http://ufomagazine.net/
~~~
The first time I saw the URL I thought the Birnes had a new feature and went to the address expecting to see something from them. I suspect that’s the problem, eh, and a problem not all that “beyond belief” as Mr. Coletta whines unconvincingly. The Birnes have no excuse to be nonplussed in the affair? I mean how _dare_ they?
Rather, “beyond belief” is Mr. Colette’s pretended incredulity and sullen intransigence in the matter!
I don’t know the legalities involved, but the history, investment, and justice outraged by Mr. Colette seems ponderous enough to trump whatever some crass pretender, like Mr. Colette, might trot out in a slimy ‘defense’, you know?
Mr. Colette obviously lives in a convenient dream-world where honesty and ethics are drawn only to suit himself. Sincerely, only one as apparently self-deluded as Mr. Colette could persist in seeing a lack of trespass in this matter. As to “watching and learning” as he advices on his Weblog… rofl!
I suspect that even his conjectured victory is likely to be Pyrrhic, in the end. But he should try to have the fun he can, I suppose. I suspect there will be precious little of that as this unwinds to a tedious denouement.
Additionally, Mr. Colette indicates that I am in the tank for Bill and Nancy Birnes, wrongly proclaims I am in their employ and demands to know what my wages are!
As to wages paid to me by William and Nancy Birnes? That’s really none of his business, is it? I can get a wage and still be ethical, unlike Mr. Colette it might be argued.
I point out that the magazine is quite clear every issue and on their web-site; however, that they do not pay their contributors.
I contribute, as it happens, because my contributions were requested by the Birnes, and they have treated me with respect and collegiality since the beginning of our association. I trust this was clear enough for the bystander, and adequate explanation why I am behind them on this matter.
That said, I remind Mr. Colette that, as he would admonish me, I _will_ be “watching and learning”… and commenting on his progress, too.
For now, the Birnes still have to dig into savings occasionally to get a _legitimate_ magazine on press (they are decidedly NOT Microsoft folks), but they’ll be plugging along with great good will and joy, I’m sure, regardless.
This unctuously earnest pretender and trespasser, Mr. Colette, seems so damned mean-spirited, inexplicably playing the naïf and painting the Birnes as “Big Biz” going after the “little guy.” Crap, reader!
He’s in fact, more a seeming intellectual thief and an errant spoiler — no better than a guy who throws a bottle of lye through your brand new plate-glass storefront, a storefront so lovingly painted, as it turns out, by a _volunteer_ effort.
I’m appalled at Mr. Colette, frankly. I suggest all fair-minded persons might be similarly appalled.
Circus indeed.
I wonder if UFO Mystic.org is available…
alienview@roadrunner.com
www.AlienView.net
AVG Blog — http://alienviewgroup.blogspot.com/
U F O M a g a z i n e — www.ufomag.com (legitimate)
July 31st, 2007 at 7:01 am
If you search the trademark database, you will see many trademarks with the acronym UFO in them. Each one is for a specific type of product. UFO Magazine would have trademarked the acronym for use as a magazine title only.
Otherwise we wouldn’t see trademarks for UFO Toothpicks and UFO Chassis.
By the way, you can’t copyright a term, you can only trademark it.
Lisa A. Shiel
www.BigfootQuest.com
July 31st, 2007 at 10:37 am
Al L,
Nice to see you stopping by again.
It seemed silly to me to bother with Colletta’s site in the first place, but of course the coupling of “UFO” with “magazine” might seem as it was designed to siphon off traffic from the ufomag.com site. Maybe it was, as you suggest.
I still wonder why the lawyer chose to complain about the term “UFO.” That aspect was what confused me in the first place. Perhaps the lawyers and the Birneses are working through the process to get the “UFO Magazine” phrase trademarked and this was the best they could do until then. I don’t see it on the trademark website mentioned in my post.
Do you know anything about that?
July 31st, 2007 at 10:50 am
Lisa,
I did search the trademark database. That’s why I mentioned that “over 20 other entities or companies have also registered the letters ‘UFO’ as well.” The link I provided for readers seems to have been broken. It is fixed now.
As I wrote in my reply to the mellifluous Mr. Lehmberg, I can’t figure why UFO Magazine didn’t trademark their full name. By the logic in their “cease and desist” letter, they could take legal action against all companies using “UFO” in their names.
I believe you’re right about the “trademark” versus “copyright” thing. Thank you.
July 31st, 2007 at 10:59 am
No pardner, as I said above, I don’t know the legalities involved but I know what ‘obvious’ is; the history, investment, and justice outraged seems ponderous enough to trump whatever Mr. Colette proposes.
Cheating, “fair and square” is still cheating, and a pile of shrew hurl smells as sweet by any other name.
Oh, btw, ’sight’ above is ’site’. If you’re gonna kick a guy’s ass it’s more effective when you spell it right. This particular ass is crossing t’s and dotting i’s on.
Making a big deal over this one precludes the next one, eh?
alienview@roadrunner.com
> www.AlienView.net
>> AVG Blog — http://alienviewgroup.blogspot.com/
>>> U F O M a g a z i n e — www.ufomag.com
July 31st, 2007 at 11:17 am
Ooooo… mellifluous… smoothly flowing honey…
I’ll allow it! LOL! See how _easy_ it is to chill me out? [g].
Don’t post, man.
July 31st, 2007 at 3:41 pm
Looking at it again, Lisa was right it is a trademark, but it says very clearly -
MAGAZINE PUBLISHED PERIODICALLY DEALING WITH UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS AND RELATED PHENOMENA.
So I will guess that is why they are obligated to defend against those who use ufo along with magazine, even though they only have the ufo part trademarked.
Ref - http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/jumpto?f=doc&state=hmf643.4.81
July 31st, 2007 at 5:11 pm
Never mind my link, apparently it isn’t a perma link. The trademark serial number is 75431858, for anyone searching the database.