>This, I think, may well be ominous.... could
this >person then, say, force
> NAQT to
remove the words "Quiz Bowl" from their >WWW site
under
> threat of litigation? After all.... "Quiz Bowl"
>would then refer to his buzzer
> system.
A
quick check with a buddy of mine who's a D.C.
intellectual property attorney suggests that there's no cause
for concern. The trademarking of "Quiz Bowl" would no
more affect the game then (I presume) the trademark
"Judge" buzzer system affects the courts. So long as you
don't officially entitle your buzzer system (if you're
the manufacturer or selling it) "Quiz Bowl", it won't
affect anything. Heck, all kinds of intramural table
tennis events and the like call themselves "Ping-Pong"
tourneys. That's the trademarked name of a particularly
crappy manufacturer of table tennis equipment. Likewise,
such a trademark would only apply to buzzer
systems--of course, due to its common parlance within the
community, it's not even clear that this guy will even be
able to trademark the term. (In the sameway that it
would have been difficult to trademark "Ping-Pong" if
the term had existed before the company, instead of
vice versa.
Nathan Freeburg