Somebody's nicked our band's name
Neil Gall
Our band have been together for over two years; for the entire time
we've called ourselves Stiltskin. Now we hear there is another
band (in the same city - Edinburgh) with the same name. This other
band reputedly have signed some sort of recording contract and
feature in a Levi's advert. However, since the name is rather
unusual we are of the opinion that someone has seen a poster up
advertising one of our local gigs or something, and has nicked our
name. It's just too much of a coincidence that two bands from the
same town might pick that name.
What's worse is that we think we might know who the other band are.
If it's who we think it is, we actually played a gig with them once,
at which time they were using a different name.
We rather like our name and certainly don't want to change it.
In fact, it's our name - we thought of it - so we're not going to
change it. What I want to know is what we can do about this,
and how to go about confronting the other band to tell them to
go and think up their own name. Has anyone come across a similar
situation anywhere ?
--
Neil Gall,
Lead Guitar, Stiltskin
Bill_H...@vos.stratus.com
found out that another band had intentions of using our name, and started
playing out under the same name, we sent a form into the copyright division
and had our name copywritten to protect us from other bands "stealing" our
name. It has been awhile since I had gotten involved with this, but if you
check with your better business bureau or local government, they can help you
obtain copies of the correct forms.
I hope this helps......
Pete Turner~
In article <2lo4qn$8...@yendi.mdd.comm.mot.com>, rich...@mdd.comm.mot.com (Chris Richardson) writes:
> I was under the impression band names couldn't be copyrighted, but
> could be protected if you showed some form of precedence...
It's a confusing issue to say the least: turns out the one thing that
you can't copyright is a number (thus names like Pentium for what would have
been called 586).
Back to the band business: The other day (after reading the current thread),
I gave the copyright issue a lot of thought. I'm not sure, but I think that
a name isn't really protectable. Technically speaking (if it were), some idiot
could copyright his name (say "Bill"), then anyone else couldn't be named
"Bill" without his permission...and we all know that's not going to happen.
You can copyright a logo, and have that logo include your band's
name. For instance, I'll bet that the Red Hot Chili Peppers logo has a
copyright. So, not only do you see the logo and think "Ah, the Chili
Peppers!", but you get the bands name locked into your head. The payoff is
that if a second group were to try and use the band's name (not the logo),
they would effectively be giving the original group "free press" because the
public's mind is already locked into the original group.
That's what I got from being read the riot act by some corporate lawyer
type a few years back...or that's how I interpreted it.
Pete
--
______________________________________________________________________________
Pete Turner | "I'm not looking back -- but I want to look
Intel Corporation | around me now"
5000 W. Chandler Blvd. |
M/S CH3-36 | -- Geddy Lee/Neil Peart
Chandler, AZ 85226 | ---------------------------------------------------
ptu...@sedona.intel.com | "...yeah, I've been to Phoenix...they call that
ATT: (602) 554-8906 | place 'The Valley of the Sun'...they should call
FAX: (602) 554-7281 | it 'The Surface of the Sun'!..."
|
Zeta Psi - Gamma Chapt. | -- Some unknown late-night comic
______________________________________________________________________________
Scott Dayman
once, but I could have forgotten.
I doubt you can copyright a common word like "Bill" as your personal
name. But a brand-name can be copyrighted for a particular product.
This comes full-circle where words like Kleenex and Band-aid become
a household word, then it seems like anybody can associate their
product with that word.
For band names, I thought there there was a name search process where
a band would submit their name to an organization who does a name
search, and if nothing turns up, you can legally claim that name
for yourself. I have heard of two instances where this caused a problem
with international bands. I believe that The Firm (Jimmy Page, etc.)
was not an original name and some conflict arose over that. Then there's
an Australian band, The Poorboys, who had to go by The Poor over here.
As well as Wham U.K., named that way because there was already a Wham
here in the U.S. And I'm sure the list goes on, but these are examples
of signed bands.
--
## Scott Dayman - Jet Propulsion Laboratory (818) 354-2205 ##
## Are you an L.A. bass player? finger sc...@asteroid.jpl.nasa.gov ##
Kris R. Thorisson
I had a band in Iceland at one time with the name Lizt. We had been
playing for at least a year and a half when another Icelandic band
used that name for their album.
Since we thought it was rather a peculiar
coincidence (the composer's name is spelled Liszt) we
talked with their record company (whom we had actually visited a
few months earlier with some demo tapes of ours) but they just
laughed. We wrote a letter to the biggest newspaper to let some
steam out....to put it simply, we gave up.
I suppose that had we been in the States we probably would have sued...
Of course, they didn't use our name for their BAND.
=kris