Crazy Canadians file suit against UFC Fan Expo...Yes it is about Comics

[CycloneComics]

Hobbystar lawsuit

[Pirate]

and now we know why caira, harmon and transplant are rich.

[comicwiz]

and now we know why caira, harmon and transplant are rich.

 

As far as I know, none of the above are trademark lawyers, and I don't know anyone here that is. I could be wrong, and if I am, I'd like to know as I have a matter that I just found out about today that requires a legal opinion with a background in US trademarks (court experience would help).

 

This is an interesting story, especially since UFC Fan Expo filed a trademark with CIPO. Eventually, this will be for the courts to decide, but it would be a smart move by HS to file an opposition with CIPO as UFC's mark is still at the formalized stage. Their case in court may well put an unbreakable submission hold on Zuffa/UFC if CIPO objects to the mark for approval.

 

 

[letsgrumble]

[Crows]

If I ran the UFC, I would say srew you guys, cancel the show, and never come back.

How embarrassing

[comicwiz]

From a fan perspective it sucks. As a fan, you pay your rate to watch the PPV fight (more if you attend the live event) and you expect GSP to not only defend his title against Shields, but to make it an entertaining bout.

 

Zuffa knows the entertainment business, and the same rules to the cards they promote apply in the business world.

 

As a business owner, you have to, at minimum, contest the issue without necessarily pursuing court action because otherwise you could risk losing the rights to the trademark by not defending it.

 

At face value it looks like a publicity stunt, but I understand enough to know its more than that, and this could turn into a Battle Royal as there is a third trademark owner using "Fan Expo" in their trademark name that technically triangulates a three-way impingement issue.

[HOTFLIPS]

Read part of the article. Could be that a competitor of HobbyStar is using the name Fan Expo?? The same people who throw NYCC throw the UFC Fan Expo.

[Ares]

If I ran the UFC, I would say srew you guys, cancel the show, and never come back.

How embarrassing

 

Yeahh Right... 2 day before the biggest show UFC has ever had and will probably be their biggest money maker they will say *spoon* it over a lawsuit and walk away...

 

Not gonna happen

[Ares]

Read part of the article. Could be that a competitor of HobbyStar is using the name Fan Expo?? The same people who throw NYCC throw the UFC Fan Expo.

 

One of the Reed Guys who helped organize the expo used to work for Hobbystar and knows about Fan Expo name

[comicwiz]

If I ran the UFC, I would say srew you guys, cancel the show, and never come back.

How embarrassing

 

Yeahh Right... 2 day before the biggest show UFC has ever had and will probably be their biggest money maker they will say *spoon* it over a lawsuit and walk away...

 

Not gonna happen

 

From what I understand about infringement cases, UFC could run the event, however if the matter goes in front of the courts, and the courts eventually side with HobbyStar, every cent generated at ALL UFC Fan Expo's held anywhere in Canada would need to be turned over to HobbyStar. This doesn't include any monetary setback/damages to the "Fan Expo" brand resulting from marketing/advertising of the UFC Fan Expo events, which in itself could be significant if the case presented in court is persuasive.

 

So, yes, they could stick their heads in the sand and run the event, pretending there is no issue, but the consequences are that the profits from the event could end up with HobbyStar.

 

It appears that HS had filed "Fan Expo" in the past, but abandoned that mark - likely for reasons of redundancy, but I also think that double-registering inadvertently opened a can of worms for someone to come along and view the expanded variation of the trademark to include the word Canada to mean the use of Fan Expo is a generic enough term not requiring identity protection.

 

Had they left it to "Fan Expo" the enforcement of the trademark is Canada-wide, so I'm not sure why the felt it was so important to emphasize Canada in the name when its geographic coverage is implied through the registration with CIPO.

 

The other thing to consider is that the term Expo was born from a shortening of the term "exposition" and well before HS's trademark registration. I won't expand on this any further, but to me it seems like a good legal argument could be made that no one should have the right to protect its use, that it isn't unique to HS's brand identity, and if anyone should have the exclusive rights to its use, it should be the International and Universal Exposition and/or World Expo (guys who ran the Expo 67). It's a longshot argument, but it still has relevance in the context of a looming dust-up between three different Canadian trademark owners claiming identity rights for the term "Fan Expo."

 

As far as any backdrop of grudges, I can't speak on this, and I'm looking strictly at the angle covered in the story which is HS's issue with the use of "Fan Expo" in Zuffa's marketing event. I'm not sure what the legal team for Zuffa was thinking - maybe they saw four registrations in the CIPO database and this influenced a fleeting decision that "Fan Expo" was a generic term that could be adjoined with UFC to make it exclusive to Zuffa. One thing is for sure, they could have just called if "UFC Conventions" and there would be no lawsuit.

 

So as ridiculous as this seems as far as the disconnect between MMA and comics/sci-fi, if someone came along and decided to run an entertainment business called UFC (short for Ultimate Fockers Championship) which matched-up ex-CIA, Navy Seal or Marine Father-In-Laws against their disappointing Son-In-Laws in a last-man-standing grudge contest, it wouldn't matter that the event was not endorsing or adhering in the strictest sense to an MMA theme or contest, but rather that the competing Focker brand would be riding the coat-tails of an already established and matured MMA brand.

 

If you think that Zuffa would allow someone to use UFC that easily without contest, then you're also likely to think HobbyStar is going to take this situation lying down.

 

[ashsaytr]

a three-way impingement issue.

...sounds painful!

[ashrael]

 

Sue! Sue! Sue!

[seanfingh]

 

Hobbystar is protecting the brand that they have developed and grown. Zuffa is a juggernaut. This should be very interesting.

[DrWatson]

Hobbystar is protecting the brand that they have developed and grown. Zuffa is a juggernaut. This should be very interesting.

Difficult to decide who to root for.

[Pirate]

UFC

[DrWatson]

UFC

More than likely.

[Pirate]

still trying to figure out how UFC harms a comic convention, but who knows. I guess there are a few who can get the two mixed up.

[seanfingh]

still trying to figure out how UFC harms a comic convention, but who knows. I guess there are a few who can get the two mixed up.

 

Likelihood of confusion is one of the actions (at least under the Lanham Act here) but there are also claims for dilution, which is like saying that the alleged unfair use has hurt whatever makes the mark distinctive.

[bellrules]

Anyone remember what happened with WWE and World Wildlife Foundation? This could be interesting.

[comicwiz]

I don't recall all the details, but World Wildlife Fund had documented seniority and common law recognition well before the WWE. The issue of trademarks rights and the eventual showdown between the two arose primarily from the similarity in the two organizations Website addresses (wwf.org for the World Wildlife Fund, and wwf.com for the Word Wrestling Federation).