• Trademark issue for the youtube channel name

Year 2013 end - Me (Priya Ranjan) and my friend Saby was planning to start youtube channel where we make short movies. We attempted couple of times but couldnt get a good director.

Year 2015 end - Here comes a new friend Rahul Kalra, he talks to us and says he can help. He made me meet a director friend of his. We shot the movie.

There has been no involvement of Rahul Kalra in movie other than making me meet his director friend and few co-ordinating activities. Basically, there's no creative contribution or financial contribution from his side in the making of the movie.

May 2016 - I created an youtube channel "Social Diarrhea" from my email id. Basically, creating an youtube channel is easy. Anyone can create it.

The movie was released and it became success. Now rahul kalra applied the trademark "Social Diarrhea" under his name in the class 41. We came to know about it now.

Now after his trademark application, we changed the youtube channel to "Social Diaries" and its easy to change channel name in youtube.

I have applied for the trademark name "social diarrhea" in class 35 and "social diaries" in class 41

But he is threatening our client not to do any business with us as he owns the trademark "Social Diarrhea".

Note: There are no paper or legal documents to prove what has happened or discussed. The youtube channel was created by me and the facebook page was created by me.

Now the questions are:

1. Does he legally own the right for the word "social diarrhea"
2. If yes, Can we get the trademark for the word "Social Diaries" in the same category without any objection from him as both the names sound similar.
3. Shall we change the channel name to something totally different so as to be safe.
4. What can we do in future to stop him approaching our clients or misleading them.
Asked 7 years ago in Intellectual Property

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3 Answers

A.No.3279332 stands in the name of LAXMI KALRA. WHO IS LAXMI KALRA? THEY HAVE STATED IN THEIR APPLICATION THAT THEY ARE USING SINCE 1-1-2016. BUT UNLESS THEY PRODUCE ANY EVIDENCE TO SHOW THEIR USAGE SINCE 1-1-2016 THEY CANT GET REGISTRATION. AND BE VIGILANT THAT WHEN THEIR A.NO.3279332 ADVERTISED IN THE TM JOURNAL YOU CAN OPPOSE THEIR REGISTRATION WITHIN 4 MONTHS FROM ADVERTISEMENT.

I SAW UR A.NO3362647 AND 3362712 THAY U ARE USING FROM 1-12-2015. YOU HAVE STATED THAT FROM UR EMAIL ID U CREATED THE CHANNEL. THAT IS A GOOD PROOF TO PROVE THAT YOU ARE THE PRIOR USER THAN HIM. EVEN THE FB PAGE ALSO VALID ONE.

STILL IF HE CONTINUOUSLY THREATEN YOUR CLIENT FILE PASSING OFF CASE AGAINST HIM....

IM SPECIALISING IN TM CONSULTATIONS, REGISTRATIONS AND LITIGATIONS FOR PAST 10 YEARS. FOR FURTHER ASSISSTANCE YOU CAN CALL ME AT [deleted] OR [deleted]

Buvaneswari
Advocate, Chennai
40 Answers
20 Consultations

4.3 on 5.0

The legality of the title to the trademark shall depend on how both present their case before TM authority.

What prevented you from making an objection to his application for trademark when he applied for one earlier. However, you my even now file an objection to his application for trademark if the one he applied for is your concept.

After advertisement of the trademark in the TRADEMARK Journal, a period of 4 months is provided according to section 21 of Trademark Act 1999, within which, the registration of the trademark may be opposed by any person.

This opposition proceeding can be filed only with the Registrar and cannot be taken directly either to the Court or the Appellate Board (IPAB). If the opposition is successful, the registration of the trademark will be refused. If it fails, the mark will be registered.

Any person may give a notice of opposition to the registration of a trade mark. This ‘person’ doesn’t need to have a registered trademark to file an opposition and can belong to any company, association or body of individuals, whether incorporated or not. Also, it doesn't matter if he/she has or has not any commercial or personal interest in the matter. He/she only needs to represent his/her own interest and to some extent that of the public.

A trademark gives identity to a brand; it is a recognizable sign, word, design or an expression which is used to identify the goods or services of a seller from those of others.

You may follow the procedure to register your own trademark.

Some of the benefits of registering your brand name are mentioned below:

Public notice of your claim of ownership of the mark

Listing in the IP INDIA’S online database

The right to use the ® symbol which conveys that it’s yours and warn others against using it

You will be able to sell and license your brand

It helps to protect your brand from unfair competitors who tries to use deceptively similar marks to sell their products hence decreasing your brand value, and you can prevent this by taking legal action against them.

T Kalaiselvan
Advocate, Vellore
84711 Answers
2172 Consultations

5.0 on 5.0

1. When you were the owner of the YT channel ''Social Diarrhea'' and somebody else applied for its trademark despite having no right to the channel then why did you change the channel name? You should have challenged the trademark in the court which could have declared it as illegal, apart from filing a criminal complaint against him for furnishing false information to a public servant.

2. Since this man owns the trademark to 'Social Diarrhea' he may now seek injunction against you and YT to restrain you from using the channel the name of which you have changed to ''Social Diaries'.

3. Challenge the trademark in the civil court and also seek injunction to restrain him from either using or claiming to be the owner of 'Social Diaries''.

Ashish Davessar
Advocate, Jaipur
30763 Answers
972 Consultations

5.0 on 5.0

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