Forum: Author Hangout

There is an interesting discussion on wattpad. A romance novelist has a series of novels with the word "cocky" in the title. You know, "The Cocky Bastard," "The Cocky Apprentice." I made up those titles, but that's the gist. So what does she do? She trademarks and watermarks the word cocky. And then has the gaul to go after authors that use the word in their titles (I guess it's popular in romance novels).

This is the link that was posted for the kboards discussion: https://www.kboards.com/index.php?topic=263084.0

Why she was allowed to trademark a common word like "cocky" I have no idea. But it was legit to watermark it. Watermarking is using the word in a certain style. The problem is, the font she chose to use doesn't allow her to do that and now she's in trouble with the font owner.

I went to the patent office and looked up cocky as a trademark. There are 2 listings owned by Hip Hop Productions for books in the field of romance.
http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/gate.exe?f=searchss&state=4810:13z311.1.1

You could tell everyone to spell it as 'cocki' that doesn't appear to be trademarked.

It's extremely depressing that a writer, having achieved a modicum of success, would then stab their struggling colleagues in the back.

Many espousers of pithy writing-related aphorisms claim that creative writers are not in competition. This is just one example that some are.

AJ

owner will be laughed out of court would she ever attempt to sue someone for a trademark violation.

Robberhand stated the above. Personally, I tend to agree with him. My understanding is trademarks are a graphic or text symbol placed on a product to associate the specific product with a company or persons product line. Others cannot place the trademark on their product.

For a book, the artwork, title, descriptions, and text making up the story are all part of the book. I suspect a lawyer could make a case in court by pointing out that the word 'cocky' used as part of a book's title, description, or story text is different from the trademark 'cocky' which identifies a book as part of her romance series.

Do you know if the woman going after people for trademark violation has been to court yet? if so, what was the ruling?

ETA: If the court rules in her favor, then authors could not legally use the word cocky in any romance novel.

I presume the guilty party is Faleena Hopkins, who seems to have churned out quite a number of books in a series with 'cocky' in the title.

Another author named Tara Crescent also has a series containing the word 'cocky' but I could only see two books in it.

AJ

There was a major court case in the US I read about a few years back based on the name of a particular mountain- I forget which it was. A t-shirt company used it on t-shirts and a beverage company used the same for their beverage. One took the other to court for trademark violation. I remember it because the decision was there was no trademark violation because the court felt the name was in the public domain and they used different fonts to display the name. The judge went on to say if the font was the same and in the same colours to the extent anyone looking at one would identify it with the other, then it would be a trademark violation. If I remember right that decision was at the highest court within that state. However, the same would likely be true at the US Supreme Court level.

Based on that sort of info having the word 'cocky' in the title would not be a violation unless done in exactly the same font, but if she trademarked something like 'The Cocky Series' then using the same wording to promote a story would be a violation. The 'Space Marine' case has made it clear certain words and phrases may be trademarked but they won't be upheld in court.