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An image of an archeologist adventurer who wears a hat and uses a bullwhip

(theaiunderwriter.substack.com)
1503 points participant3 | 2 comments | 03 Apr 25 17:55 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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ionwake ◴[04 Apr 25 07:49 UTC] No.43579391[source]▶
Not sure if anyone is interested in this story, but I remember at the height of the PokemonGo craze I noticed there were no shirts for the different factions in the game, cant rememebr what they were called but something like Teamread or something. I setup an online shop to just to sell a red shirt with the word on it. The next day my whole shop was taken offline for potential copyright infringement.

What I found surprising is I didnt even have one sale. Somehow someone had notified Nintendo AND my shop had been taken down, to sell merch that didn't even exist for the market and if I remember correctly - also it didnt even have any imagery on it or anything trademarkable - even if it was clearly meant for pokmeonGo fans.

Im not bitter I just found it interesting how quick and ruthless they were. Like bros I didn't even get a chance to make a sale. ( yes and also I dont think I infringed anything).

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1. mrguyorama ◴[04 Apr 25 21:08 UTC] No.43587620[source]▶
Allen Pan, a youtuber "maker" who runs in the circle of people who run OpenSauce, was a contestant on a Discovery channel show that was trying to force the success of Mythbusters by "finding the next mythbusters!". He lost, but it was formative to him because those people were basically all inspired by the original show.

A couple years ago, he noticed that the merchandise trademark for "Mythbusters" had lapsed, so he bought it. He, now the legal owner of the trademark Mythbusters for apparel, made shirts that used that trademark.

Discovery sent him a cease and desist and threatened to sue. THEY had let the trademark lapse. THEY had lost the right to the trademark, by law. THEY were in the wrong, and a lawyer agreed.

But good fucking luck funding that legal battle. So he relinquished the trademark.

Buy a walrus plushy cause it's funny: https://allen-pan-shop.fourthwall.com/en-usd/

Note the now "Myth Busted" shirts instead.

Hilariously, a friend of Allen Pan's, from the same "Finding the next mythbuster" show; Kyle Hill, is friends enough with Adam Savage to talk to him occasionally, and supposedly the actual Mythbusters themselves were not empathetic to Allen's trademark claim.

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2. hobofan ◴[05 Apr 25 04:57 UTC] No.43590880[source]▶
> THEY were in the wrong, and a lawyer agreed.

Not sure where you get that from. He doesn't say that in the cease & desist announcement video (though it's worded in a way that lets the viewers speculate that). Also from every time it's brought up on the podcast he's on, it very much seams like he knows that he doesn't have legal ground to stand on.

Just because someone let's a trademark lapse doesn't mean you can rightfully snatch it up with a new registration (as the new registration may be granted in error). It would be a different story if he had bought the trademark rights before them lapsing.

Allen Pan makes entertaining videos, but one shouldn't base ones understanding of how trademarks work based on them.