[Foundation-l] Wikinews is giving out press credentials

[Delirium]

Daniel Mayer wrote:

>--- Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
>  
>
>>What trademark violation is going on here?  Trademark law only prohibits 
>>commercial use of a trademark for a competing product in the same 
>>market.  
>>    
>>
>
>Trademark law does not only prohibit commercial use. Any use which dilutes a
>mark in a particular market is a potential violation. Using a mark that implies
>an official connection when no such connection exists is also a potential
>violation. 
>  
>
That's incorrect.  Trademark law does not protect dilution---that's 
dilution law, a more recent, less internationally standardized, and much 
different beast, and it only applies to "famous" marks like Coca-Cola 
(so you can't name your company Coca-Cola even if you don't make 
beverages, because it's a famous mark subject to dilution law).  It's 
unclear that Wikinews is a sufficiently famous mark to qualify for 
dilution protection.

-Mark