The most obvious example I can think of what I am curious about is the IM client Trillian, and Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
Do you guys think they had to get permission to use the name? Or is it fair use or what?
I recall a lawsuit probably fifteen years ago when the Tolkien estate tried to sue a guy for using the name Gandalf and it was thrown out because he was able to show that it existed in a historical text where JRR got a lot of his Dwarf names from.
I’m working on a web app and would like to name it after a character from a novel, and will gladly contact the author to seek permission / blessing regardless of the thread’s comments - but I’m curious what to expect.
I don’t know (or necessarily think) this helps but… “It’s always easier to ask forgiveness, than it is permission.”
I don’t know about what they had to do to get permission for Trillian, but Douglas Adams always was fascinated with technology, especially the internet and methods of sharing information/communication. So if they did have to get permission (which the wiki page doesn’t go into), I can’t see Douglas or even his estate really disputing it at all.
TASER International is famously named as an acronym for “Thomas A. Swift’s Electric Rifle”. The book “Tom Swift and His Electric Rifle: Daring Adventures on Elephant Island” was published in 1911. I don’t know if they had any copyright issues with that, though.
If there are issues, it wouldn’t be with copyright, but trademark. Unlike copyrights, which expire after a set period of time, trademarks last as long as the owner continues to defend them. On the other hand, trademarks can also end at any time, if the owner stops defending them, and getting a trademark in the first place is not automatic: A name will only be trademarked if the author specifically chooses to trademark it, which might or might not happen. Then, too, trademarks are restricted to things which might cause brand confusion. There’s little chance that someone might confuse a chat client with the Hitchhiker character, or think that the client was endorsed by Douglas Adams, so even if the name “Trillian” was trademarked (I don’t know if it was), the makers of the chat program might not have needed to ask permission, anyway. On the other hand, if you were selling sticks of wood as “Harry Potter wands” without permission, then J. K. Rowling and her team of trained attack lawyers almost certainly would have a strong case against you.
Of course, even if the character isn’t trademarked, or if your useage is sufficiently different to not be covered under a trademark, it’d still be polite to ask permission first. Most authors are a lot more approachable than most folks think, and are likely to give permission.
Thanks folks, as I said - I do plan to ask permission, but I wanted to get some info before going to him about it.
Maybe you could Ask Jeeves!