At the movies I recently noticed that AMC Theatres holds a trademark (well, service mark, actually) on the phrase “Silence is Golden.” See here. Before the feature starts, they play a clip that says “Silence is Golden,” the way other theater chains run clips that say “Please don’t talk.”
I understand the basic concepts of IP law. I hold trademarks and copyrights (no patents yet, but maybe soon). So I’m not really asking for a primer on what trademark is.
But there are a couple of points about this service mark that I just don’t understand. First of all, just what is the service that AMC is providing? They’re telling us to shut up. This is a service? (And it’s not even a particularly obvious or direct way to say “shut up” at that.)
Secondly, what benefit does AMC gain from obtaining a service mark on this phrase? In other words, why did they bother? How does this put money in their pocket or give them a competitive advantage? They can prevent other theater chains from using this phrase. So what?
Sure, it doesn’t cost much to file for a service mark, but I can’t see how they’ve gained anything at all. So what’s the point?
This is a very good set of questions, and I’ll take a stab at answering them.
I guess it is a PART of their service.
The services they are providing are the same ones that they have always been providing - i.e., providing facilities for showing movies. However, the mark they have chosen to use in this case to distinguish their services actually has a meaning which is ‘suggestive” of the quality of their services - i.e., it suggests that they provide quiet facilities for showing movies, an important characteristic which would distinguish them from their competition. Bear in mind that they could have decided to use anything as a mark, but in this case they have chosen a suggestive mark for obvious reasons - a suggestive mark can act like a mini advertising campaign - “Hey guys, we provide quiet theatres!”.
How does this put money in their pockets?
It is likely they are betting that consumers will pay to see movies in quiet theatres.
So why didn’t they just start an advertising campaign that pushes the fact that they are quiet?
Well, that could have been an option. However, if you get a trademark registration you can invest time and money into it and build brand recognition to the point where people see “Silence is Golden” and immediately think of your cinema. It becomes an indicator of the high quality of services provided by your company. In addition to this, as you yourself pointed out, you can prevent competitors from using it, because you got it registered first. Note that this might not be an important point now, but in the future, when Silence is Golden becomes a household indicator of the good movie-watching experience, and you failed to trademark it, anyone will be free to use it without your permission, and pretend that their business is affiliated with yours, thereby taking away your consumer loyalty and diluting your brand.
In addition, by rolling out “Silence is Golden” now and service marking it, AMC has paved the way for such follow-on messaging as "A Second Large Popcorn is Golden"sm and "Coming Back Tomorrow is Golden."sm
cankerist: Thanks for a thoughtful answer. I hadn’t thought of it with that level of subtlety before. I suspect your reasoning is very close to what they thought in getting the mark.
That said, I don’t think they have much chance of succeeding: Silence is Golden becoming associated in millions of minds with the AMC theater chain? I have nothing against them, but c’mon. But since filing probably cost them only a grand or two of their lawyers’ time (maybe less) it was probably worth it to them to stake the claim.
BTW, I looked up a few other major theater chains and didn’t find any that had trademarked similar “shut up” notices. So it could be that this hasn’t proven a particularly useful technique in the theater industry.
BobT: Although Harley Davidson tried to obtain a trademark on the sound in 1996 (reportedly in response to Japanese makers whose bikes allegedly mimicked the HD sound), I don’t believe they succeeded. To quote the USPTO: “A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol or design, or a combination of words, phrases, symbols or designs, that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others.” A sound is not a “word, phrase, symbol or design” or combination thereof. It would be much harder to determine exactly when and how a sound was unacceptably close to a trademarked sound.
People talk a lot about the “trademark sound” of the Harley, but I think it’s just a figure of speech. If you think I’m wrong, go here and look for yourself. (I didn’t have the patience to check every one of the 250 live and dead trademarks HD holds to see if one was a sound, but from the listing, none appeared to be a sound.)
I guess it is a PART of their service.