Is there a legal reason why fictional shows use imitation brand names? Often, when I watch TV shows, I'll see or hear about an imitation of a real brand name. As an example, here is a parody of Walmart from The Simpsons The store in the picture is unambiguously supposed to represent Walmart. They're even using Walmart's Styling Is there any legal reason why they do this? and if there is, does it provide any actual legal protection?
In general, TV shows or other fictional works will use fictional brands to avoid infringing the brand's trademark. According to Wikipedia, this occurs more often when the brand is used in a potentially negative way. In your specific example, however, it's clear that (as commenters pointed out) the brand "Sprawlmart" was a parody intended to be humorous and was not for legal reasons.
Speaking from a U.S. perspective (which may or may not generalize elsewhere), trademarks can be used by different companies when they operate in different industries. An answer on Avvo by Kurt Van Thomme captures the important question when using an existing trade name in a new industry: The question in these kinds of circumstances is often whether the goods or services offered by the two companies are sufficiently related such that a consumer would be likely to think a company providing the first product or service would be reasonably likely to provide the second product or service also. Kurt's answer includes an example where the name "Pioneer" is used by a seed company and an electronics company. The two products are unlikely to be provided by the same company, so there is low risk of consumer confusion. In my layman opinion, it seems unlikely that J.K Rowling or Warner Brothers would use the trade name Voldemort to market a software development tool (as it seems unlikely they'd market a software development tool at all, unlike a complete video game, which would be a more likely product), so you could legally use the name insofar as it is not likely to cause customer confusion. Note that you still might attract negative legal attention if the trademark holder is particularly litigious, so when I say "you could legally use the name" I mean that you could probably win a lawsuit (at whatever legal fee costs) if one were filed against you. However, some marks are regarded as "famous" or "well-known" in some jurisdictions. In that case, the mark is afforded much broader protection, and your ability to use it in a different industry is greatly diminished: Famous marks are those that enjoy a high degree of consumer recognition in a particular jurisdiction or in a specific field of commerce or industry. However, few trademarks enjoy the status of “fame.” Examples of marks held to be famous in certain jurisdictions are COCA-COLA, KODAK, WIMBLEDON and VIAGRA. For example, you could not start a business selling automobiles under the brand name "Coca-Cola" even though it is tremendously unlikely that the Coca-Cola Company would branch out into selling cars. The mark's status as "famous" would still allow the Cola-Cola Company to succeed in stopping you from using that mark in commerce, even in a vastly different industry. If the trademark holder of the name Voldemort succeeded in persuading a court that the mark met the jurisdiction's standard for a famous mark, then you could not use the name even for your software development tool. Note also that because trademark is intended to reduce confusion over the source of a good or service, trademark holders can lose their trademark by failing to defend it from confusing uses. Therefore, some trademark holders aggressively pursue even borderline cases to ensure they don't endanger their trademark.
Yet I publicly wear shirts with copyrighted designs all the time. I'm unclear about this; do you mean T-shirts you have made yourself using copyrighted images or T-shirts you have bought? If the former then it is a prima facie breach and you could be sued by the copyright holder. You would probably not be as it would be impracticable. If the latter then there are 2 possibilities: The manufacturer/distributer/retailer chain all hold valid licences to put the image on a T-shirt and display it in the usual way so there is no breach involved. The manufacturer/distributer/retailer chain does not hold a valid licence in which case there is a breach and the copyright holder would target, say Wall-Mart rather than you. what about displaying ... works of art in my yard? Notwithstanding that it can be viewed from a public space, your yard is not public; therefore this is not public display.
The "Crabs" game can be legal if it is seen as a form of parody. That is one of the forms of "fair use" that allows copying (within limits). This is to allow the use of limited amounts of copying for critical or "mocking" pieces, which are considered a form of free speech. Two other issues come into play under "fair use." The first is whether or not this is "commercial" (yes) or non-commercial (e.g educational) use. That is mildly negative for "Crabs" but by no means dispositive. The second is the likely market impact, whether the new use tends to compete with the old use in its "home" market, or whether it is likely to open a new market of a very different, perhaps "opposite" audience that might later buy the original as a "crossover." The "Crabs" game seems to address the "green" or at least "pro animal" (PETA) market. If the defendant can show that the "Cards" market addresses e..g., your "inner Nazi," making it "opposite," that would be ideal. It would be less convincing if "Cards" were addressing e.g. human rights, because that might be seen to overlap with the green market in terms of social conscience.
General Rules The rules on this vary somewhat by country. In some counties the is no trademark protection unless a mark is formally registers. In others use &quot;in trade&quot; offers a degree of protection even in the absence of registration. The US follows the second rule. Some of Europe follows the first. But in pretty much all countries trademarks (aka trade marks) are only protected when they are &quot;used in commerce&quot; and are only protected against other uses &quot;in commerce&quot;. This mans that a phrase or design or other possible mark is only protected when it is functioning as a mark, that is it is used by the maker to identify or advertise a product or service (hereafter I use &quot;product&quot; to mean either or both). Moreover a mark is only protected when an alleged infringer uses the mark (or a similar mark) in such a way that people might reasonably be confused into thinking that the infringer's product comes from the same source as the products of the owner of the mark, or is approved, sponsored, or endorsed by the owner of the mark. A simple literary or pop-culture reference is normally not trademark infringement. This is both because a well-known phrase is not usually protectable as a mark at all, and because a reference to it is normally not infringement, even if the mark is protected. The likelihood of confusion is a very important concept in trademark cases. Examples The phrase &quot;Elementary, my dear Watson&quot; Is often used as a reference to the Sherlock Holmes stories and novels. But it was never used to brand or advertise those stories, so its use in a novel or video game now would not be infringement. Even if a game used that phrase as a title, it would not be infringement, because the phrase is not protected. All this would still be true even if the Sherlock Holmes stories were still being published. The tagline &quot;In space, no one can here you scream&quot; was used extensively to advertise the movie Alien. It had some protection as a mark (in the US), and might well have been registered for fuller protection (I haven't checked the US register of trademarks, or any other for this phrase). A game titled with this phrase might well be infringing. A game where a character speaks the phrase at some point probably will not be infringing. Caution All that said, exactly where the limits of infringement lie depend on the detailed factual situation. Before investing sizable amounts of money or time and effort on such a project, it might be wise to consult a lawyer knowledgeable about trademark law in one's particular jurisdiction, and make sure that the risk of suit is not to great for one's tolerance.
Yes, you may The layout of the board and its appearance are not protected by copyright, because they are not expressions or any other type of copyrightable content. Even if they were (say if some protested art was displayed on the board) you are displaying this for instructional purposes, and not harming any market for the board, so fair use is likely to apply (in the U.S.). The device could be protected by patent, but you are not copying or imitating the board, nor showing anyone how to do so, so that would not apply. You are not selling or advertising the board, nor knock-offs of it, so trademark protection would not apply, even if a protected trademark is visible on th board. Just in case, be sure to make clear that your video is not authorized or endorsed by the maker of the board.
Names cannot be copyrighted at all, in any country. They can, however, be protected as trademarks. The general idea is that if one uses a name to identify a product or service, or a creator of products or services, others cannot use the same or a similar name to identify their products or services in such a way that a reasonable person might be confused into thinking that the two came from the same source, or one was endorsed or approved by the other. Trademarks are limited in scope to a particular country, A name that is protected in Canada, say, will not be protected in the US unless steps have been taken to protect it there. In some countries a trademark must be officially registered to get any protection, In others, such as the United States, merely using the mark can give a degree of protection, although registration give more protection. Each country maintains a trademark registry which can be searched for existing marks. There are search firms that will do such searches for a client, and also search for marks in use but not registered, for a fee. Trademark protection is generally restricted by the type of product or service involved. An anti-virus program, say, called &quot;Guard dog&quot; would probably not interfere with a fantasy game called &quot;Guardog&quot;. A private security service of the same name would pretty surely not interfere. The range of protection depends on how widely known the product is, but &quot;software related&quot; is a very wide area, and except for famous marks, a mark protected in connection with one area of software will not be protected in a very different area of software. Names that a purely invented, such as Kodak, are more strongly protected than descriptive marks such as &quot;Best Pizza&quot; Particularly famous names such as &quot;Microsoft&quot; get additional protection even outside their usual areas, so &quot;Microsoft Pizza&quot; might be a problem. Logos and other graphic marks can also be protected as trademarks, but that is not what the question asked about. The styling of a trademark, such as a particular font, choice of colors, and so on, can also be protected. This is called &quot;trade dress&quot;. A disclaimer making it clear that a somewhat similar name is not related, and the is no affiliation can help avoid avoid an infringement suit. For example: Pear brand kites are in no way associated with, sponsored or approved by the makers of Pear smartphones. On this site we cannot give specific legal advise, so we cannot evaluate whether a specific proposed trademark would or would not infringe an existing mark. It might be well to consult an attorney with trademark experiences before finally choosing a name and doing marketing under it.
The trivial answer is yes, at least under certain circumstances, as the example you give shows. First, the concept of substrings is not particularly useful in trademark law. IF that were the case, then we wouldn't be able to have a company called "Gaudiest Clothing Brand" because it contains the substring audi. But, you might say, what about looking at words instead of characters, as with the example of "Linux" and "The Linux Foundation." In that case, I offer the example of "Target," which is a word found in literally thousands of US trademarks. You'll notice that the first item on this list where word mark is simply target, rather than a phrase containing that word, doesn't even belong to the well known chain of stores. This brings us to another important aspect of trademark protection, which is that the mark's purpose is to identify a producer of goods, a provider of services, or particular goods or services themselves. You could probably start a bookstore called McDonald's, unless you're near Redmond, Washington, but you certainly would not be able to use that name for a chain of hamburger-based fast food restaurants. Back to the subject of Linux, one possible explanation here is therefore that Linux is a trademark for an operating system, while The Linux Foundation is a trademark for a non-profit foundation that is concerned with the operating system. The trademarks don't represent competing entities. Consider, for example, the disclaimer on volkswagenownersclub.com: VolkswagenOwnersClub.com is an independent media publication. VolkswagenOwnersClub.com and its owners are not affiliated with or endorsed by Volkswagen AG or Volkswagen of America, Inc. Volkswagen is a registered trademark of Volkswagen AG. All rights reserved. All information Copyright 2006-2010 (Also consider, for example, the case of Apple Corps, Ltd. and Apple Computer, Inc..) As far as I can tell, however, "Volkswagen Owners' Club" is not directly relevant to this question, because it is not a registered trademark, and the question concerns two registered trademarks. I am not sure whether two such trademarks could coexist if there were an adversarial relationship between their owners. In this case, hwoever, the trademarks are used together because the owners have a collegial relationship. They work for a common goal, the promotion of the product identified by one of the trademarks. The foundation's use of the trademark is therefore undoubtedly with permission. In fact, the Linux foundation is Linus Torvalds' employer, and one of the foundation's purposes is to manage the Linux trademark that Torvalds owns. Now the question of derivative trademarks, such as My Linux is clouded by the fact that Linux is an open source operating system. In principle, you can't modify a product and then sell it using its original trademark unless you have permission. For example, I don't suppose I could rebottle Coca-Cola with some added salt and pepper and sell it as *Phoog's Coca-Cola" unless I had permission from the owner of the trademark. With Linux being an open-source project, however, the terms of the open source license probably explicitly permit people to use the trademark under certain restrictions if they offer, for example, a customized distribution of Linux