And any update? As for translated trademark issues, I have seen some Japanese company failed to be recognized officially since they left challengers who had tried to registered translation of a certain trademark for years (Crayon Shinchan Issue) and it has therefore been said that the best defence in the PRC market would be registration beforehand even if you have no intention to join that market at that moment. Hopefully it wouldn't be our case but there is no information at any rate.
On 4/24/06, Jean-Baptiste Soufron jbsoufron@gmail.com wrote:
I'll get in touch with a chinese law firm through our japanese law firm.
Best,
Jean-Baptiste Soufron wikimedia foundation chief legal officer
Le 23 avr. 06 �� 19:47, Andre Engels a ��crit :
2006/4/23, THD theodoranian@gmail.com:
Hi, There are some things different between Chinese characters and English word. Every Chinese character has its own meaning. When we translate a foriegn language into Chinese, sometimes we do it by meaning, but more often we use characters with similar pronunciation for translation. Wiki is a generic name, so it can't be a trade mark. In Chinese sphere, wiki can be translate in many ways. Such as �S�� (now all the Wikimedia projects in Chinese language, the first one pronunces as "wei", and the second pronunces as "gee"), ���o(first "wei", second "gee"), and �S��(first "wei" , second "ke")etc. �S�� is one of translations of the word "wiki", and it was chosen by Chinese Wikipedians to be the only name of Chinese Wikipedia. Before Chinese Wikipedian's choosing �S�� as the name, there was no famous name of wiki technology. The problem is "if we don't register �S��, the Chinese Wikipedia will face the challenge of changing its name (in Chinese)". Wikipedia is one word, but �S���ٿ� have 4 characters. In Chinese text trade mark, the government protect the usage of charater singly.When someone registers �S��, other people can't use �S�� in their own trade mark. So the situation is not the same. THD
I am not into Chinese trademark law, but in general is it not a defense against a claim of trademark violation that one used the trademark continuously since BEFORE the person claiming violation used it? I know that this is the case here in the Netherlands, there is even the rule that if that other person knew about your previous use of the trademark, their registration is considered mala fide, and can be cancelled on those grounds.
-- Andre Engels, andreengels@gmail.com ICQ: 6260644 -- Skype: a_engels _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
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