[Fluxx] Fluxx for American Girls

[Bryan Stout]

Thanks, Carl, for your response.  It led to me doing some research on this, 
and a better understanding.

>From my reading, the "use it or lose it" aspect of trademarks means that if 
you don't use a trademark over a certain length of time (such as 5 years), 
you lose the legal protection of it.  This does not apply to copyrighted 
material.

I asked a patent lawyer friend about my previous statement, and found I was 
wrong.  Whether or not you go after infringer A does not affect what happens 
when you go after infringer B.

What does happen is that if you do not respond to infringer A during a 
reasonable time, then they have "implied consent", and you can no longer try 
to enforce the copyright against them.

Bryan


> On Sat, 05 Apr 2008 10:30:49 -0400, "Bryan Stout" wrote:
> > I completely share the contempt for the litigious attitude.  In a way, 
> > it's
> > too bad that the laws require people to go after the little guys if you
> > don't want it thrown out of court when you go after the big guys --  
> > though I
> > understand the reason for it.
>
> For what it's worth, I think you're referring to an aspect of the law
> that's unique to trademark law, not copyright. That is, to my
> (obviously, extremely limited---no legal training etc.),
> understanding, the "enforce it or lose protection" stuff is unique to
> trademarks. And that does have bad effects at times, but I also
> understand the concept behind it.
>
> Copyright on the other hand, gives the copyright owner a tremendous
> amount of latitude in treating people differently. That is, as a
> copyright owner I can give different people differing permissions for
> how to use my work, and that in and of itself isn't a problem.
>
> -Carl