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From: werme@alliant.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.sys.apple
Subject: Re: Apple trademark crackdown
Message-ID: <404@alliant.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 3-Feb-87 00:19:14 EST
Article-I.D.: alliant.404
Posted: Tue Feb  3 00:19:14 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 5-Feb-87 04:02:25 EST
References: <1000@gould9.UUCP> <1665@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu>
Reply-To: werme@alliant.UUCP (Ric Werme)
Organization: Alliant Computer Systems, Littleton, MA
Lines: 25
Keywords: Mac, Apple, logos
Xref: watmath comp.sys.mac:1138 comp.sys.apple:571

In article <1665@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu> woody@tybalt.caltech.edu.UUCP (William Edward Woody) writes:
>
>What amuses me the most about the Apple logo crackdown is the Apple logo
>itself--will Apple sue Apple Records, the company which used the green
>apple with a bite out of the side, the company which published some
>old Beatles stuff (I think--I have to check my record collection), and
>the company from which Woz and Jobs obviously stole their logo from?!?

I doubt it - copyright law allows trademarks to be "overloaded" (if you'll
excuse Ada jargon creaping into the language) as long as their usage is
obviously different.  Hence both MacDonalds and Apple can sell Macs since
computers taste bad and hamburgers don't compute.  Hartz Mountain can sell
Flip Chips (dog treats) as can DEC (PC boards).  On the other hand, Omni
magazine tried to start out as Nova magazine, but the folks at PBS squawked
because they had a program called Nova.  The conflict was that both were
in media - one printed, one aired.  If Omni was a decent magazine, PBS
might not have complained.

It's often a judgement call and some tricky situations can arise.  For
example, if Apple Records and Apple Computer both start publishing CDs,
then there could be an interesting lawsuit!
-- 
 The Art of Programming         Ric Werme
 needs to be tempered with      uucp: decvax!linus!alliant
 the Structure of Engineering   Phone: 603-673-3993