Korobeiniki is a trademark of Tetris Holding

i was looking through cell phone tetris games and saw this in tips & hints:

i didn't know "tetrimino" was trademarked, or had never noticed it before. this is from tetris.com:

all i could find at USPTO was "tetrimino" appearing in the description of a logo design. the description of the corresponding trademark at WIPO doesn't mention anything about the word "tetrimino" though.

of course, "tetromino" is perfectly safe, but i thought this might be useful for people using the word "tetrimino" associated with their fan games. maybe "tetriminoes" is ok though

 

TM denotes a mark that a manufacturer is using as a trademark. In general, trademarks should be in use before the manufacturer registers them. That's why you get TM on the title screens of 8-bit Tetris games. Once you get the registration certificate from USPTO or foreign counterparts, you can use the .

 

Check this out;

http://www.ocremix.org/song/1049

A small list of free remixes.

 

According to wikipedia the mathematical term is tetromino. But I prefer the term tetramino ("tetra" for 4 is more familiar for me than tetro).

 

do you mean that a company can use the TM symbol before even applying for a trademark? because i didn't notice anything at USPTO about an application for "tetrimino", while it listed other tetris-related trademarks for which applications were submitted but they were unregistered.

i thought it was interesting that the legal blurb at eamobile.com didn't mention anything about "tetriminos", while it was mentioned at tetris.com as a trademark.

 

Yes. See Trademark symbol and Common law trademark (US) on Wikipedia.

The TetriSCOmpany's standard legal blurb evolves along with the Guideline, as it explores new ways to try to secure broad exclusive rights around the Tetris franchise. Elorg was first called "Elorg", then "Elorg, a Tetris Holding company" (Tetris DS), and now just "Tetris Holding".

 

i still don't see why there's not a difference between

a) attaching a trademark symbol to something without submitting an application for a registered trademark, or without the intent of registering

and

b) attaching a trademark symbol to something after submitting an application for a registered trademark, but before the trademark becomes registered.

although in either case i guess there's nothing the owner of the trademark could do legally to stop others from using it. but something tells me that the intent behind trademarking "tetrimino" is to give the impression that the piece shapes are trademarked and may soon be restricted. in fact it isn't written as Tetrimino, but Tetriminos, conveniently followed by "are trademarks of Tetris Holding, LLC." (referring to all of their trademarks, but worded in an ambiguous way) in the legal blurb at tetris.com. this could deter a number of programmers from creating falling tetromino games, "to be on the safe side". and if you do a search at USPTO and nothing turns up, how are you to know whether the trademark is for the word or that which the word describes?

 

Non-word marks generally have standardized names by which a company's trademark notices refer to them:

"Apple and the Apple logo are trademarks of Apple, Inc."
"Nintendo and the racetrack logo are trademarks of Nintendo."
"MOTOROLA and the Stylized M Logo are trademarks of Motorola." (Never mind that Williams Electronics/WMS Industries used a nearly identical logo before Midway Games bought Williams.)
"Java and the Java Steaming Coffee Cup logo are trademarks of Sun Microsystems, an Oracle company."

If the intent were to declare the shapes themselves as common-law trademarks, then you'd see a notice like this:

"Tetriminos and the respective shapes are trademarks of Tetris Holding LLC."

But then the "trade dress" claim might be doing the same thing.