Loss of Trademarks…
Writers Just Shovel Money into a Fire…
By the very nature of what we do as Indie writers and publishers, we are creating trademarks. Common Law trademarks, but still trademarks.
I always thought trademark meant “lawyers make more money.”
But the reality is we all create trademarks all the time with our books, our series, our businesses. And no law says you must register them. And don’t let any fly-by-their-wallet lawyer tell you that you must.
The term “trademark” basically means you are doing business (trade) with a name (mark). And trademark is basically the right to exclude someone else from making money with your name in the same area of business.
It is also a property. It has value.
And unlike copyright with the limit of Life of the Author plus 70 years, trademark can go on forever if it is used for business in a consistent fashion and the business stays alive.
Common law trademarks are first-in wins, but that is often tough to prove in a dispute. There are also varied time-periods that the mark must be used in business without lapsing. Ranges around five years. Range.
Why am I bringing this up? Struck me that James Blish estate with his cities in flight might have made some nice licensing money from Stargate Atlantis as I watched the show tonight. Just one of a million examples from the old days and now indie writers leaving money on the table.
The lack of knowledge about copyright by writers always stuns me, especially by writers putting their work out in stores. But the total lack of awareness of the value of the trademarks and brands is even more stunning.
What most traditional writers did when they died was give their literary estate to their agents. Book agents, as a class, have less knowledge about copyright and trademarks as their writers. So estate after estate are just left to rot and trademarks expire. And the writer’s work is forgotten.
So here in the indie world, say a writer has a great series of books, sold well, title of series is a trademark of one level or another. Books are left to just go dormant, five years later after no sales, the trademark is gone. Or worse, books just left to die by an estate that doesn’t care.
The massive yearly Licensing Expo is based on licensing trademark and brands and more hundreds of millions in deals happen there every year than I want to imagine. The Licensor (that’s us writers) license our copyright to stores like Amazon and license our brands and trademarks to companies that want to partner with us.
But 99% of all writers are too busy to learn copyright and trademark and branding and thus just shovel money into a fire, money they had no idea they could even have for their work.