I also have a Tower Defense game coming out in the next 30 days, with Tower Defense in the name. I can work around it, but would much prefer not to. I think we need to find someone who is a copyright attorney and perhaps a fan of the genre. My first thought was posted on here already - this is ridiculous, why not copyright First Person Shooter, FPS, Role Playing Game and RPG and "guide" developers away from ever using them. I don't bear any ill will toward com2us, but they should know their reputation is being sullied by this. It just doesn't make sense and if they're waiting till they get a legal challenge...well, they're about to get one. Seriously, who knows a good lawyer in this field? I'm happy to be a co-plaintiff with Port Defender.
This is insane with the Tower Defense (C) .....I agree...some guys now uses TD in the App name....which I like very mutch...it's catchy enough... The guys from the FIFA succeeded to (C) "WM 2006"...which is insane...because at 2006 there where many many "WM 2006" not only the FIFA one....
Com2Us is bad and they should feel bad. Good thing I only bought one of their games on sale for a buck and it sucked anyway. Com2Us is Tim Langdell?
If the term tower defense predates their application (which I think it does), I think you can petition to have their trademark revoked. Just point the trademark office to such--surely Google can help. If I was an affected developer, I'd certainly look into it. You can probably make a case that the terminology is merely descriptive, they haven't been actively promoting their game (I never heard of their game), and also haven't been correcting the "improper" usage of the term by websites and news organizations. If you don't actively protect your trademark, you will lose it. I will definitely reconsider any future purchases of com2us games. I hate trademark and patent trolls. (By the way, developers who are affected by this underhanded tactic by com2us should band together and throw their money behind an effort to revoke their specious trademark.)
This is plain ridiculous. The only thing thats worse then this is suing someone for a game you made twenty... oh, wait, that happened too! I think this requires Tim Langdell, Com2us, you, and Mobigame to come round a big 'ol campfire and sing some War.
This will probably be blasphemy to Americans but does anyone know if the trademark prevents the use of the British spelling "Tower Defence"?
Maybe they can use some broken english to get around this: "Where are you going?" "To, er.. De fence!"
I don't know if anybody has made this point all ready but... I'm not an expert, but I've read on wikipedia that, in some contries, including the US, you are legally allowed to use somebody else trademark, in order to compair your product and say why a competing product is better. Its a specific exception to the trademark law. I guess thats why in pepsi comercials they sometimes compair to coke with a blind taste test and they are allowed to show the coke can with trade mark and all.
Yes but you can't go and name your product "Better than Coke" for example. This is the alleged trademark infringement in this case, ridiculous as the allegation is.
Wow. Just read through this thread. That's pretty underhanded in itself. I certainly won't be purchasing any Com2Us apps if that's how they want to play. Good luck to you!
I think Com2Us is banking on the fact it is too expensive for a single person to break their hold on "Tower Defense". I also find it interesting the only two people sticking up for Com2Us are related to NoDPad? Wonder why that is?
Ah, conspiracy theories Unless I'm missing someone I only see Kunning and myself here, and I wasn't siding with Com2Us.
Forget changing the name, this should be a fairly easy trademark to overturn (lots of proof of prior use out there) and some company who wants to get some publicity should just do it and send out a press release at every turn. It's like very well spent advertising money - and a chance to become a hero in the genre - for the person or company who actually does it. Even the USPTO themselves rejected the trademark on "DESKTOP TOWER DEFENSE" with one reason being because the term "Desktop Tower Defense" was a generic description on a genre of game. Read this from the USPTO themselves: The wording DESKTOP TOWER DEFENSE is at least merely descriptive of these types of games. See the supporting evidence from the World Wide Web in this regard specifically referring to desktop tower defense games offered by others in trade. For example, see the attached World Wide Web excerpt from Downloadable Content Reviews stating: “Like all desktop tower defense games PixelJunk Monsters is very simple, you build defense towers to stop monsters from getting to your base.” See also the attached World Wide Web excerpt from Teentechblog stating: “Similar to the wildly popular desktop tower defense games, the object is to build and upgrade towers so that you can prevent demons and other hellish creatures from making it to Heaven..”, among other similar excerpts. In addition to being merely descriptive, the applied-for mark appears to be generic in connection with the identified goods and, therefore, incapable of functioning as a source-identifier for applicant’s goods. In re Gould Paper Corp., 834 F.2d 1017, 5 USPQ2d 1110 (Fed. Cir. 1987); In re Pennzoil Prods. Co., 20 USPQ2d 1753 (TTAB 1991); see TMEP §§1209.01(c) et seq., 1209.02. See again the World Wide Web evidence attached in this regard specifically referring to desktop tower defense games offered by others in trade. Under these circumstances, neither an amendment to proceed under Trademark Act Section 2(f) nor an amendment to the Supplemental Register can be recommended. See TMEP §1209.01(c). I can't believe that someone whose making a bit of money on Tower Defense games doesn't see this as a major opportunity to get lots of press and hype for their projects. It would be like shooting fish in a barrel, as they say.
Com2us is going a bit too far I guess. There are hundreds or thousands of tower defense game out there and can they sue them all?? Regrettably the thread starter has changed the app's name (I will do the same if I got sue like that...) but this poster make a very valid point: Sending email to all major tech site (techcrunch etc) people are going to side with you no doubt... too bad the opportunity is lost. Anyway good luck to your future apps.
