Legal help needed

BuZz

https://retropie.org.uk/2017/02/legal-help-needed/

RetroPie has been trademarked in the USA by a 3rd party. They are using the trademark to issue take down requests to retailers, including those who are just selling hardware listed as “compatible with RetroPie”. Meanwhile they are selling RetroPie via their website and Ebay.

There is a risk that this person may try and use the trademark against us too.

We would like to challenge the trademark – It was filed after we were using the name, and they are using it to associate themselves with our software.

If you are an attorney or think you could help – please drop us an email at retropieproject [at] gmail.com.

Many thanks.

caver01

@BuZz The same person/group also registered EMULATION STATION.

markyh444

I hate people

LS650

How incredibly scumbaggy. :(

Rion

What in the h**l! It's apparently registred to Aditya Rawat

Filing Date - 2016-05-18
Registration Date - 2016-12-27

Attorney Shehla Syed

hooperre

@Rion Dude. Anything we can do in protest?

Direct Dial & Fax: (978) 274-7053
Email: ssyed@westhillcounsel.com

lilbud

@hooperre I say we do what byuu did when the USPS lost his snes package, post it everywhere and tell anyone who will listen

cylum

I've posted links and information on this situation to a few of the bigger RetroPie Facebook groups and a couple Anonymous communities to help spread the word.

Rascas

I am not a lawyer, far from that, but didn't you registered the name/brand in some country ? If you have, you can contact the US autorities, give the documents to prove you are legit, and once they check that trademark is "fake" / "ilegit" they should remove it, since this is cleary a case of taking advantage of something that aren't theirs and than they will have problems specially if you sue them.
I am sorry but I cannot explained this very well, i lack the proper english vocabulary for that.

daeks

@BuZz maybe that helps you for contacting: https://www.facebook.com/eddywebs (seen in some recalbox/retropie facebook groups/postings)

byo

If you can prove you used that name before the trademark was registered with the website and forums, wouldn't that be enough?

gizmo98

This is so outrageous and disgusting. Selling hardware bundled with RetroPie is worse enough. But stealing our name, sueing other people "in our name" and selling our software?! I have no words. If everything is futile delete all and everything. I hope they will be happy with their "trademark" then.

edmaul69

@BuZz i have some friends who have had issues with a guy selling bootleg copies of their colecovision games. I am trying to get all the info i can from them to help you. They do happen to have a friend in ebay that shut him down and permanently banned him from ebay. If he is selling the software on ebay i might be able to help with that. Any copyrights you have will help. But no matter what he does he has no legal rights to your work from the second you created it and i should be able to get the info you need to fight his copyright.

auswear

I have registered several trademarks and unfortunately if someone gets in before you there's not much you can do. Even if you own the website and they have the trademark in your country, they can legally take it from you.

He's created it in the correct class however from what I can tell, he's only trademarked a logo and not a word. Applications go into a public national gazette for 6 months prior to approval so people can object to them.. but honestly, who's going to check that every few months? My trademarks go through easily every time.

It looks like he's created some kind of international trademark but I can't see what Countries it's applicable to. Each Country you choose has it's own associated cost - you can't just blanket trademark the entire globe.

If you can find out for sure if it's just that ugly typeface he trademarked they you're ok, but if it's the word then there isn't much you can do. The easiest (and cheapest) option is to change the name of Retropie (and trademark it before you go live!)

UDb23

It seems Retropie is not yet a registered trademark in Europe, according to EUIPO site.
Single class registration is 850 euro.
We could think of reaching the amount by donations so you can register it, at least in europe.

Rascas

@auswear Yes, this is more or less what I know from my experience in my country, I think it works more or less the same here. This is a bit complicated, because like you said, you can register different parts/things like, names, logos, intelectual property etc, and national or international, and depending what you do, the price changes alot.
I am not aware of applications (intelectual property ?), but if it is like you said, since it seems that in this case it was approved for opposition in 2016-10-11, can't the real RetroPie still make an objection ?

Nismo

I don't understand how some people can do this so easily, it's a shame.

FlyingTomahawk

Sorry to hear about your troubles.
This seems to be common practice these days. They register all kinds of names and URLs even stuff that doesn't exist yet. Just so that you have to pay them later to release that name or brand if you want it. Very sly way of doing business.
These people are scum, the only thing they do is think how to piss on other peoples hard work so that they can enrich themselves.

Those registration offices should really rethink their policies and stop people from registerering brand or names that they are not directly connected or associated with. These things should not happen in the first place.

Worst case shut down everything, rename, rebrand, register everything and I mean everything , every single pixel. Then re-launch.

caver01

What I don't understand is their angle. If they are trying to profit from selling something called RetroPie and then RetroPie rebrands, they have to do it all over again. It seems like you would want to leave well enough alone if you don't want the product to pivot underneath your marketing effort.

hooperre

His uploaded project on GitHub admits he isn't the original creator of EmulationStation.