I was just wondering if this kind of fighting over game names makes any sense, but for the lawyers:

http://www.pcgamer.com/wasteland-2-devs-issue-cd-letter-to-alien-wasteland-studio/

I for once like inXile less after this stunt. I cannot shake off the feeling, that their behavior is very similar to schoolyard bullying.

Fallout:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/fallout

Window(-s):
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Window

Try to use it in a name of your products and you'll see Attack of Angry Lawyers... :>
(hint: Total Commander previously was known as Windows Commander)

Apple lawyers attacked owner of e-shop with electronics because of their domain (ap.pl as short from "Art Production"). Demands were rejected by Polish court.

The same was for domain a.pl (food e-shop).

Regardless of greedy lawyers and their stupid demands there is "protection of own Intellectual Property". If some company will made shoes and name it "wasteland boots" (without any hints to inXile games) it's OK because they're not related. But when competitors (other game developers) are using word "wasteland" in their computer game's name then it could be problematic...

What about the X Window system, which predates Microsoft Windows (and Linux) and is still in use on modern Linux systems? (Yes, there is Wayland and Mir, but neither is particularly common, yet.)

Huh, until this moment I never knew the real reason Total Commander was renamed from "Windows Commander". I never checked into it at the time - just assumed that "Total" sounded cooler or something...

Though it's apparently less forced than that: http://www.ghisler.com/name.htm

Unless of course the above article was written with a big fat gun/lawyer pointed at his head... ;)

I'd rather not think about legalese too much, else my brain might explode...

In this case, Brian Fargo had to wait more than 20 years to recover the rights to use the word "Wasteland" in the video-games area (and that is why we have "Fallout" now, which was also lost to Fargo). No big surprise that they are protecting their right to the word so tightly.

I think they went all Cease & Desist-bullying only after the Alien Wasteland developer allegedly asked to be paid for changing the name. A knee-jerk reaction to being unexpectedly squeezed for money.

I'm not saying they were right to contact him to begin with, it seems a little petty. Still, it is all about getting the best representation on Steam and there is a slight chance a low budget game with the same'ish name can sour the first impressions of an uninformed consumer. There are SO many people who go by "word of mouth" even when they don't understand what they are being told, surely there have been a few attention deficit Steam users going "Wasteland? From the store? It looks like crap, I'm skipping it".

I hope people understand that you don't get to trademark "words". A lot more goes into it than just the word itself: It is the type of product (video game in this case), the marketing design material (logo/font style, posters), the sales pitch (how the product is described). You don't own the word, you own a trademark.

Owning a trademark gives you a head start when you take someone else to court for leeching off of your trademark. You can show the judge that presenting a game with the prominent display of the word "Wasteland" in a particular styling is important to your business and it is a result of the investments and hard work you put into it. The judge can then decide whether or not the defendant appears to have been taking advantage of your product's or company's reputation by imitating your trademark, and whether or not this has hurt your business.

I doubt inXile could have won a court case against Alien Wasteland, but court cases are very costly and time consuming. One guy can't take the risk going up against a company with lawyers, even when the law suit is flimsy as hell.

This is an older thread, but there is one thing thats missing from all the posts.

The absurdity of US Trademark law.
If at any point they don't try and defend their trademarks, someone else can use that as evidence against them and weaken future cases should said cases go to court.

Same thing with ... I think it was Bethesda and Mojang? Over the word "Scrolls".

Most of us look at these games, and see they are different. US law looks at them and says, "Possible opening for the weakening of future trademark cases."

It doesn't matter that its a case where its not really all that related, they must defend it so that someone with an actual trademark violation can't come along later and say, "They didn't defend it there, so I can do it here. Neener neener."


Edit: I'm an idiot, and and rezed a thread when I thought the most recent post was within the last few days. Oh well. Edited a line about said resurrection.