Not a joke, unfortunately. The developer of “No Man’s Sky” said they finally got done with three years of legal hassles for using the word “sky” in their title, because that word is trademarked by Sky TV & Broadband in England. He said that this company forced Microsoft to change “Skydrive” to “Onedrive”, so they’ve forced even the biggest boys to cave in. See: x.com
Now… how the bloody dickens can a company claim ownership over a basic word in the English language? I thought that was illegal.
Trademark laws. I guess.
They don’t “own” the word, but they would make sure that nobody has the word in the title of their product. Because it is “totally” possible to confuse “no man’s sky” with some company I’ve never heard of.
That is completely insane.
When asked for comment, a representitive of Sky TV said “When we’re done with the No Man’s Sky guys, we are gonna sue Delta Airlines, because they fly in the Sky, and we own the word Sky, so therefore…profit!”
They probably have no actual legal standing, they are just big enough that they can threaten enough tedius groundless civil suits on the matter to force their opponents to change because the cost of fighting wouldn’t be worth it or could drive smaller companies into bankruptcy.
I mean the easiest way to solve this problem would be to not release the game in the UK.
Exactly the reason trademark & copyright law should be done away with. Rick Falkvinge, who is a very smart man I respect, had called it years ago.
It just got to the point where copyright monopoly & tm law stifles creativity instead of encouraging it.
Well we now know that Sky is on everyone’s shit-list for being tight arsed twats.
Nice PR guys.
Yeah its painfully stupid - and not just in the UK. Here in the US a company threatened me with legal action over a super simple “two common word” name of an app and even temporarily had the app in question removed from the play store. I felt like fighting it because it was so frivolous but at the end of the day it was easier and more financially responsible to just forget about it and change the name.
It’s all kind of childish if you ask me, and I think any common words should be open for anybody to use… then again it is important to protect anything that brands a company, but I feel like those companies need to be limited in what exactly qualifies for trademarks, copyrights and patents.
I won’t disclose the particulars like who the company/individual was or anything but just believe me - it was just about as ridiculous as could be.
So much for my Alien game having the word “Sky” in it. It is called Light In The Sky. I mean how can that be trademarked if it’s not just called “Sky”. But I mean really, if I see a light in the sky, I’m breaking the law if I say I see one?
Lets…not go that far
First off, Sky TV is a british company, they’re basically the British equivilant of Comcast in America, they are a huge telecom company, and like Comcast, they’re kinda dicks.
Now, as far as trademark and copyright go, they are two different things. Copyright has more to do with artistic works, while Trademark have to do more with logos and phrases and such. Basically so you can’t start a burger joint and call it McDonalds.
Now, those kinds of protections are legitimate in their intended form. But clearly Sky TV are abusing these rules
These kinds of protections are important, but they are constantly abused. It’s not that there is something wrong with them in principal, it’s just the loopholes that exist and the way big companies abuse the system
Like, Sky TV must OBVIOUSLY know that no one is going to mix up a huge Telecom company with a tiny indie game, they don’t even use the words in the same way, and obviously they have absolutely no case. They’re just being dicks, because they know they can get away with it. Theres no other reason, their case holds no actual water, they just know it would be expensive for their opponents to fight the case, and think they can make them cave just on that alone.
The only thing that really needs to be done is more sensable rules on this kind of thing that close all these obviously exploitable loopholes that screw smaller companies. But of course, if Britain is anything like the US, if the Parliment building was flooded, they probably couldn’t even agree for long enough to pass a bailout bill for themselves.
I wonder what the settlement was. Either they won the case or they paid Sky for the rights to use the name.
We’ll never know
Yes, probably.
What I mean that if someone has enough money (to spend on lawsuits), it is probably possible to waste few years of your life in the court, even if you did nothing wrong.
@neginfinity - it’s just it’s pretty ridiculous man. Like I could see if you just used the word “Sky” or something in reference to said product that would make it appear to be a blatant ripoff. But just for including one of the most common words in the entire world that’s just not right.
Anyone watch the extra credits video on the topic? Sky TV is just as much a victim of the way the law is written as No Mans Sky.
Trade mark law basically says you must actively defend your trade mark. Otherwise you loose the right to the trade mark. Sky TV knows this is a bad PR move. But figures the cost of doing nothing is bigger.
Chances are No Man’s Sky agreed never to go into broadcasting. There are probably restrictions on how they can use the term. And they would also have to give up the right to sue if Sky TV ever released games or a gaming service. This last one is important. If streaming gaming ever becomes a real thing, Sky is well positioned to be a big player. So they need the rights to use the name in the gaming space.
It’s likely the only money that changed hands was payments to lawyers.
This is a very bad idea. Trade mark law is built around consumers being able to trust who made the product they are using. Consumer confidence is a good thing. Trade mark law could probably do with a reexamination, but abolishing it is a bad idea.
Copyright is another story, and has nothing to do with this thread.
Yeah the fact it took 3 years is worrying and stupid.
Well, that’s how it works.
Last time I looked into trademark law, I think there were roughly 2 or 3 paragraphs of text explaining how does trademark law work in this situation.
Yes, without tradmark law, cheap low-quality knockoffs will be able to legally use original brand names. That’s a fairly bad idea.
Shame he can’t keep his website online (Error 523 through CloudFlare). 
Maybe it’s part of the conspiracy by the Disney’s lobbyists for Copyright extension trying to silence him! :o
Yeah but the trademark officials shouldn’t have allowed this business to claim a common word such as “sky” in the first place. That is absolutely stupid. “Sky TV”? Sure. Makes perfect sense. Comcast may be trademarked but what in heck is a “comcast”? Nothing. It only has meaning for the Comcast corporation.
Also shocked that this happened in England. I thought only the USA had such stupid legal things going on.
added to the silly list:
What else I’m missing?
It’s pretty insane really. I mean if they are going to allow companies / individuals to register and claim common single words… taken to its ultimate inevitable outcome… nobody can produce anything unless it has a name/title such as “FSFKJH@*&&^@” and then I suppose companies will be claiming those as well. lol
Seriously, we all really need some people in charge of these things to actually be smart enough to think these things through.