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GreetingZ All, The UP licensing program is a farce, and will eventually be shown to be just that if UP is stupid enough to actually allow this to show up in any court that they don't own via political payoffs. Trademark law only applies to like products and services. Every trademark case that's ever been decided references the "ten foot rule", established by the courts in the mid 20th Century (geez, I never imagined I would be saying that about something that happened during my lifetime!), I believe for Tide detergent, whereby, if an average person can distinguish between two products' trademarked attributes at a distance of ten feet, then there is no infringement. There's no way that anyone who isn't legally blind will ever confuse a prototype piece of railroad equipment with a model of it, visually or functionally. Model railroad products are not used for the same purpose as prototypes, i.e., hauling cargo (but, those wily G, 1:12 and 1:8 modelers might be tempted to disprove that notion!). As for the argument that liquor stores and brothels could tarni***he reputation of another, unrelated business, the courts do not agree. It would be perfectly legal for a brothel to be named "Union Pacific" (although "Pacific Union" would seem more accurate), and some might make the argument that UP's executive offices, particularly those of their lawyers, constitute just such a brothel, based on their recent behavior! As for copyright, neither "Union" nor "Pacific" can be copyrighted, and even if they had tried to copyright "Union Pacific" when the company was formed in the 1860s, because copyrights only lasted about 50 years or so back then, it would have reverted to the public domain by the early 1900s. Note that they are attempting to protect their more recent logos, such as the winged herald, because of this. I know all of this because a company I worked for successfully trademarked a non-language (i.e., made-up) word for a software product I developed, that was also a trademarked word for a product used to keep pizzas warm during delivery. No one seems to have complained that our software didn't keep their pizza warm! If anything, we should all be reminding the model manufacturers of the above facts, and that if they're uninformed about trademark law, then they need to find better lawyers (hint, the really good ones will take on a case on spec, since they will collect their fees from the well-heeled idiots in the large corporations). The only reason some manufacturers have caved in and signed agreements is because they don't feel they can afford the legal fight individually. Apparently, the Model Railroad Industry Association doesn't have any lawyers, or at least any worth their salaries, if there are some, or their member companies would have collectively told UP to go find something else to do with their lawyers (like maybe starting a brothel). The reason corporations spend billions to have their names plastered on things like race cars is because of exposure. All we need to do is convince the media to give model railroads equivalent levels of exposure and we can turn the tables on UP, CSX, and any other transportation company that may try to bolster its bottom line via this kind of bogus licensing program. All Z BeZt, Jim
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