A note on my use of "do ask do tell" as a domain name, maybe a movie name

Let me reiterate my use of the phrase “Do Ask Do Tell” in my 1997 and 2002 books, and of my largest website doaskdotell.com.

It’s possible that future employment opportunities could force me to scale back my personal web presence, in ways that I may discuss later. In some situations that I can envision, it might not be possible for me to display my own material in a “free entry” fashion indefinitely. Furthermore, some time in 2010, my material may very well be restructured and simplified.

I don’t claim that “do ask do tell” is a trademark, but I am committed personally to using the term for the foreseeable future in conjunction with a certain social mindset, that has arisen in reaction to the military’s “don’t ask don’t tell” policy.

I do envision a motion picture based loosely on some materials in the 1997 book (greatly reorganized) and I would want to be able to use the “Do Ask Do Tell” to lead off the movie title. If there were to be considerable trimming or removal of material from sites to avoid potential employment conflicts, they would not go so far as to credibly prevent my keeping the registration of the doaskdotell domain. More details may come later if necessary.

USPTO still shows only one DEAD registration of the phrase from the middle 1990s.

IMDB does not show any film names starting with this phrase, neither does Sundance. However, there are films called "Ask Not" and "Do Tell".


Generally, movie and book titles are not regarded as trademarks until they have sequels and become “franchises” (like Lionsgate’s “Saw” franchise).

Delta may give up its NWA brand

Just as I’ve criticized movie studios for letting go of their indie brands, so I wonder about the airlines. The FAA has given Delta the permission to operate Northwest as part of itself and to phase out the Northwest brand. Here’s the Commercial Appeal story from Dec. 31, 2009 (link).

I wouldn’t reserve a domain name “northwest” any time soon. I think it was a great brand, that helped the Twin Cities attract other business while I lived there 2007-2003. (As I've said, ReliaStar was a great brand before ING.) I’m sorry to see it go. I don’t know if Delta kept its Comair brand for small jets either. Sometimes small airline brands (like Mesaba) have been kept.

But if major companies want to protect themselves from prospective trademark dilution, they should keep their brands alive.

Sometimes domain names that parody have led to infringement claims

Here’s an older trademark case I found from a Reason article (link) by Michael Lynch all the way back in 2000. The article is called “Post No Ills” and refers to a lawsuit by U-Haul against owners of a website called “U-Hell” claiming trademark dilution and infringement after a bad move. The suit was dismissed in Arizona but refilled in Georgia. The article got linked to in a newer story about the growing list of litigation against naïve bloggers and webmasters.

In other words, a name that is a parody of a company name might lead to a trademark dilution claim, but the Act in 2006 has some defenses regarding parody (check the link to the law from my June 2007 posting).

I’ve had to see where this case went.

ING could use an old name for its US insurance operations effectively

Here’s a trademark thought from my own work history past. Call it a ghost of my own Christmases past (or perhaps New Years Eve's past, with Y2K 2000). I read that the Dutch financial conglomerate ING may have to sell off a lot of its insurance operations to help pay back the Netherlands for the bailout, and maybe also because there are continued bad loans in places like Dubai.

So it’s logical that ing-usa could become a separate insurance company in the US and trade on the NYSE with conventional stock under its own name. It would amount to a combination of ReliaStar and part of Aetna. It’s not clear whether the ING Direct could be part of this, or become still a differently traded company.

I think that the “old” ReliaStar brand for the Minneapolis company (from 1995-2000) would make a great brand again. (It got acquired by ING partly because Wall Street didn’t like the way certain parts of ReliaStar’s reinsurance business had been managed around the time of Y2K, and greed took over.) The wordmark is strong, and the blue trade dress was striking. The “political” problem would be whether the other pieces, many of them in Hartford and Atlanta (Aetna) would get recognition.

But from a trademark perpsecitve, ReliaStar was a great name for business.


In the meantime, I won’t try to take the name.

Trademark fight ditches Apple's Use of "Mighty Mouse"

A company called Man-Machine offers “hyghenic, washable keyboards and mice”, as shown at its own website here. This sounds like an appealing concept in a world where suddenly we are worried about dangerous influenza viruses (H1N1 and maybe H5N1 down the road) that could remain dangerous on workplace-related or home hobbyist surfaces. I guess one could imagine computer components that are cat proof for people who led stray neighborhood “friends” in.

But Man-Machine also has a registered trademark for its “Mighty Mouse”. A bit of background: Decades ago, 20th Century Fox developed a character “Mighty Mouse” for its Terrytone cartoons (in the days when movie theaters showed them), and this was an acceptable deviation from Disney’s “Mickey Mouse”. But totally different lines of business can use the same wordmark as long as common sense suggests there is no possibility of confusion (that can be debatable).

That’s the rub. Apple computer has gotten served for trying to use “Mighty Mouse” as the name of its new component for newer post-iMac G machines. But it makes sense that USPTO would rule against Apple (which it did on Oct. 6), because this is in the same line of business. So Apple, darn it, has to come up with another name.

The story, by Ronald O. Carlson, is on Mac.Blorge here.

Craigslist sues a few companies for spam ad generation, claiming trademark infringement

The New York Times, in the Business Section on p B4, reports today (in its “Bits Blog”) that Craiglist has followed the example set a few years back by AOL in suing spammers. The story is here. Craigslist is suing a few companies and individuals (at least one of whom is “anonymous”) for spam-loading ads on its site, claiming trademark infringement as well as copyright infringement and the violation of the DMCA.

The legal action this time seems to get some sympathy; it’s not part of the “copyright wars”.

One of the defendants is Red Trumpet, which runs “Craigsup”. When I tried to access the site, Webroot Spysweeper gave me a warning and did not let me access all of the site.

Craigslist has drawn amusing “criticism” for its use of older technology, and has legal battles on its plate due to adult services, which may have been implicated in a recent tragedy in Boston.

ICANN, US Dept of Commerce continue contract; ICANN policies continue

The United States Department of Commerce has executed a contract with ICANN for some technical management of many areas of the Internet, especially domain names. The link from ICANN is here.

In a general way, this suggests that the current policies at ICANN regarding domain name disputes, particularly with reference to trademark claims, would remain intact, and would be effective in American law, even given the concept of prior dilution in effect with the Trademark Dilution Revision Act passed in 2006.