An RL case that could save Mar Sara's toches

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Once the People's Republic of Mar Sara, settled by the fabled Starsearchers, Mar Sara was long one of Shireroth's farthest-flung colonies before now finding its way into the Bovic Empire.

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Vilhelm Benkern
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An RL case that could save Mar Sara's toches

Post by Vilhelm Benkern »

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21409490
Book at centre of space marine row back on sale

An e-book at the centre of a row over who can use the term "space marine" is back on sale on the Amazon website.

The Spots the Space Marine story was taken off Amazon after model-soldier maker Games Workshop complained it infringed its trademark on the phrase.
[...]
And digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said it had then helped Amazon "review" the case.

In a statement about the row, the EFF said it was "outrageous" for Games Workshop to claim any rights over a term that had been in wide use in fiction since the 1930s.
[...]
The online chatter also prompted Games Workshop to put a statement about the row on its Facebook page, in which it said it had "no choice" but to act in cases where its trademarks in a commercially available product were being used without its consent.

Despite this, it said, it had never claimed to have rights over the ways in which the terms "warhammer" or "space marine" were used in day-to-day speech. This everyday use also covered a "body of prose", it added.

"Trademarks as opposed to use of a word in prose or everyday language are two very different things," it said.

"Games Workshop is always vigilant in protecting the former, but never makes any claim to owning the latter."
Vilhelm Benkern DEOMI, Member of the Order of the Dragon, Silver Swan, Red Dragon
Dirigent of Musica, Count of Mar Sara
In Aryasht Prapta Vrteti, former Prince of Aryasht; Zaila Vrteti, Norfolknath
In Elwynn Benjamin Sebasokrator Timothy Quentin Kern, Duke of Raikoth
In Khalypsil Representative of the Wisdom

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Orion
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Re: An RL case that could save Mar Sara's toches

Post by Orion »

Indeed, the term "Space Marines" was popularized back in early sci-fi serials and collections, such as Amazing Stories and others. Just within the context of micronational history, we've already been using the term for over a decade.

Of course, we're not trying to make money off of this hobby either, so it's not as if we have an agenda to use the term to turn a profit.

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