The Oscar-winning actor has trademarked several phrases, including “Alright, alright, alright” from the cult classic film, Dazed and Confused.
The Oscar-winning actor has trademarked several phrases, including “Alright, alright, alright” from the cult classic film, Dazed and Confused.
The strategy behind this is also to be able to sue after the fact to get a cut of whatever was created from stuff that ought to have been protected but wasn’t. It’s not just a clip of him doing triple alrights that he applied for TM for. There is also one of him sitting down, one of him standing up. They tried to cover a whole spread of sora et. al. generated bullshit. It’s an interesting strategy that is only necessary because the law on the books lags behind the developments in image or video generation. It may not work at all but it’ll be a success if they win one case with this.
How would this work for material made between the quote and the time that they trademarked it?
They could argue they are free using those instead?
They would have to try fighting it on non-trademark grounds. However, being able to point at having been awarded one afterwards may carry some weight there as well. My impression is that their strategy doesn’t rest on this alone.