[Foundation-l] Wiki trademark issue for ZH Wikipedia in mainland China

[Aphaia]

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 at 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 at 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 ¾S»ù (now all the Wikimedia projects in
> >> Chinese
> >> language, the first one pronunces as "wei", and the second
> >> pronunces as
> >> "gee"), ‡ú¼o(first "wei", second "gee"), and ¾S¿Í(first "wei" ,
> >> second "ke")etc.
> >> ¾S»ù 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 ¾S»ù as the name, there was no famous name
> >> of wiki
> >> technology. The problem is "if we don't register ¾S»ù, the
> >> Chinese Wikipedia
> >> will face the challenge of changing its name (in Chinese)".
> >> Wikipedia is one
> >> word, but ¾S»ù°Ù¿Æ have 4 characters.  In Chinese text trade
> >> mark, the
> >> government protect the usage of charater singly.When someone
> >> registers ¾S»ù,
> >> other people can't use ¾S»ù 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 at gmail.com
> > ICQ: 6260644  --  Skype: a_engels
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KIZU Naoko
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