Trademark Registration

International? Free?

[moftary]

Hello,

This is my first experience in internet legal stuff. I have established a website back to 2003 in a very unique name, and registered the .com and .net domains thinking that this way I have all rights to this unique company name.

Facing legal difficulties with google, I found out that my unique company name has to be a registered trade mark so I can be protected. Well, my company is legally established in my country, Egypt but what about the internet?

Researching the issue, I found some government organizations, all US and some saying that they are international, provides trademark registration as a commecial service.

Now, and hopefully my words not sound flaming, is the WWW about USA? How come I would have to pay hundreds of dollars to protect the company name that I chose? What gave these organizations the authority to this in a commercial way?

I assume that it's fair enough that on the internet, the .com or .net registrant should have been the trademark holder, and even if there has to be an organization to settle this, it should be a real international organization and this service has to be for free, or at least for a small cost that covers the organization expenses.

Yes, I am from a 3rd world country. But even in the UK you can form a whole legal company for around £20. How should I pay a US organization $300 to register a trademark of a company that I formed for £20?

Sorry for the very long message and any feedback is appreciated.

Cheers,
mOftary

[BigDave]

It is not about just the USA, it is about being an international entity, and following the laws of EVERY country that you are doing business in.

If I have a US business, I have no rights in Egypt under US law, only under Egyptian law. You as an Egyptian have no rights in the US under Egyptian law, only US law.

As it is, a trademark in the United States only gives you protection against someone else in the same geographical area as where you do business and in a similar category of business.

As for the costs involved, if you want to play the international game, you are not likely to get any discounts just because you are in a third world country. Someone has to pay for the ajudication of these issues, and I don't think that anyone else is going to volunteer their own funds for that purpose.

By the way, even though the Unites States is not currently the internet, it certainly does retain certain founder's priviledges, and I doubt that they are going to give up control too easily. For example, .gov, .mil and .edu are all top level domains that are US only. Claiming certain priviledges as a founder is not unfair. If Egypt had created the internet, they would have similar rights, and that would not have been unfair either.

[moftary]

Thanks for your reply.
I know you are right.. if I am disputing a trademark with another entity, it should be settled under the laws of the battlefield:)
But still I think that nowadays it would be fair enough that the domain holder turns automatically to be the trademark owner.

[BigDave]

In most countries you would certainly be able to claim that since you own the domain name that you are the one that is therefore entitled to the trademark, and the court would most likely award it to you. But you would still have to pay to register it.

But I don't think that is really what you want.

What I am saying is that you can claim a trademark on "example.com", but that it does not necessarily give you the right to a trademark on "example" when you own example.com.

And just because you get a trademark, that does not mean that you have total control ove how other people use that word. All it gives you is some control over whether someone can use it in a way that causes market confusion. Of course, the amount of control varies according to the laws of the different countries.