# The artist known as digbat

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-artist-known-as-digbat/6415>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [January 21, 2000, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-artist-known-as-digbat/6415 "2000-01-21T19:26:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Padeye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@Padeye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Padeye)\
**Post date:** [January 21, 2000, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-artist-known-as-digbat/6415/1 "2000-01-21T19:26:00Z")

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I thought about this when I read something that referred to Prince “changing his name to a Zapf Dingbat.” What are the limits of legal names or name changes when it comes to something like this? A graphic design such as TAFKAP likes to be not called can be trademarked and copyrighted but it can’t be typed. What if I wanted to mistreat a baby by giving it such an “innovative” name? “His name is Bob, but only in Bodoni poster 16 point, not courier, and punctuated with an unpronouncable symbol.”