When Steve Austin was on the Late Late Show, Kilborn asked him if he got the idea of his wrestling name from the Six Millon Dollar Man. Austin laughed at the question, but didn’t really answer it.
I still don’t see how he can be sued for that.
Just an aside, because I think this is trivia that needs to be removed from my brain please:
Michael J Fox included his initial so as not to be Michael Fox (whoever he was) an already registered actor.
Except Michael’s middle name is Andrew!
But who wants to be ‘Michael. A fox.’?
Not him. So in honour of funky actor Michael J Pollard, he chose J instead.
Told you that had to be removed from my brain.
So, would I be allowed to wrestle under the names James Bond or Jay Gatsby? How about Bone Cold Steve Austin?
And wouldn’t anyone want a hunk of my T-Shirt revenues?
Has anyone ever noticed that the names Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock are often followed by “TM” ?
My guess is that Paramount has trademarked the names of most Star Trek characters to prevent this exact sort of thing from happening, and since the $6M Man people failed to do this, there was nothing to stop Stone Cold from taking the name.
Keeves: Has anyone ever noticed that the names Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock are often followed by “TM” ?
I noticed this too. All their characters (listed on Star Trek Continuum) have TM after their name, except for “The Doctor”. Either it’s too generic, or the Doctor Who people have some claim to it.
A little disturbing: they have trademarked “Q”. A letter! Does this mean that Q will never again sponsor a “Sesame Street” episode? 
Stone Cold Steve Austin is a member of the Screen Actors Guild. He wouldn’t have to be as a wrestler, but he’s appeared as an actor on at least two TV episodes, and you have to join the union before you can do your second.
And, of course, Paramount hasn’t trademarked the letter “Q”. They’ve trademarked a-godlike-space-alien-named-Q.
John W. Kennedy
“Compact is becoming contract; man only earns and pays.”
– Charles Williams
Then what about Q of the James Bond genre? He was around before Star Trek’s Q. (Qs, queues?)
When I was a kid, I got a plastic model kit of the Six Million Dollar Man throwing a gorilla, and a plastic model kit of the Six Million Dollar Man kicking in a steel door.
Both of these kits included little blurbs describing the Six Million Dollar Man’s origins. In both of these blurbs, “Colonel Steve Austin” did not appear with a TM anywhere in his name, but “Bionic” did.
I sure hope the folks who produced the cartoon series titled The Bionic Six got permission from Harve Bennett or Universal Studios or whoever owns the trademark on “Bionic”!
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