I must have overlooked/deleted the prior E-mail as spam.
You know you're getting somewhere when the Director of Legal Operations takes the time to send you 3 pages via locked PDF.
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June 20, 2011
VanVinci142/OrionzRevenge
Owner, MBTI9000.tripod.com
VanVinci142@hotmail.com
Re: Trademark Infringement at
http://mbti9000.tripod.com/
CPP Ref. No.: CPP-778 MBTI 9000.Tripod
Dear Sir,
As you may remember, I am the Director of Legal Operations at CPP, Inc. (“CPPâ€). CPP is
the exclusive licensee of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator®, MBTI® and Myers-Briggs®
trademarks and the exclusive publisher of the MBTI instrument. I am writing today to
follow up on my letter from February 24, 2011 regarding trademark misuse and brand
confusion on the website
http://mbti9000.tripod.com/.
Again, CPP is not accusing you of any intentional wrongdoing, and I trust that you will be
willing to make the changes requested. As a personality type enthusiast, I hope you will see
the value in protecting the reputation of the MBTI instrument.
I would also like to alert you that by infringing on CPP’s trademarks, you are in violation of
the Lycos Terms of Service,
http://info.lycos.com/tos.php. Lycos is the parent company of
Tripod, the site which hosts your webpages. The TOS lists the following as Prohibited
Conduct:
Upload, post, e-mail, otherwise transmit, or post links to any Content
that infringes any patent, trademark, service mark, trade secret, copyright
or other proprietary rights ("Rights") of any party, or contributing to
inducing or facilitating such infringement.
Although CPP hopes to work with you directly, if we do not hear from you about the issues
addressed in this letter by August 1st, 2011, CPP will contact Lycos to request removal of the
infringing material from your website.
The issues on your site relate to trademark misuse and brand confusion, a form of trademark
infringement. Affected pages include your homepage (
http://mbti9000.tripod.com/) and
two other pages:
http://mbti9000.tripod.com/mbti-test9000.htm and
http://mbti9000.tripod.com/mbti-test9000T.htm. These pages are listed for your
convenience; however, you are responsible for applying the requested changes to all relevant
webpages, whether listed or not.
Brand Confusion
As I described in my last letter, brand confusion is a specific kind of trademark infringement
which occurs when a brand name is used to label another product. I have included a new
FAQ sheet which I hope will help you understand the issue. If you have any questions,
please contact me for assistance.
CPP takes issue with the name “MBTI9000â€, which is both your site’s name and the name
of a personality test on your website. Since this test is not the MBTI assessment, labeling it
with the MBTI trademark constitutes trademark infringement (brand confusion). It is also
inaccurate and misleading to your site’s visitors.
CPP must respectfully demand that you cease and desist with all potential brand confusion
between your quiz and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator assessment tool. Eliminating brand
confusion will involve removing the MBTI, Myers-Briggs, and Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
trademarks from much of your website. This includes, but is not limited to, trademarks used
in your website name, in descriptive texts, and in the headlines and links associated with
your personality type quizzes. Since the MBTI trademark is embedded in your Tripod
website name, you will need to work with Tripod to cancel or change the name MBTI9000
to remove the MBTI trademark.
As a suggestion, an efficient and accurate alternative to using the MBTI trademarks on your
website may be to use more generic terms, such as “personality type†and “personality type
testâ€. Naturally, you may use the trademarked names when referring to the actual MBTI
instrument or its development. Please contact me if you have any questions about this.
Trademark Guidelines
Once you have eliminated brand confusion from your website, please apply CPP’s
Trademark Guidelines
https://www.cpp.com/Pdfs/Trademark_Guidelines.pdf to any pages
on your site which still include CPP’s trademarks. If you need assistance or clarification
about this, do not hesitate to contact me.
Conclusion
To summarize, this is a second legal notice from CPP demanding that you eliminate brand
confusion on your website,
http://mbti9000.tripod.com. Specifically, CPP asks that you
remove the MBTI family of trademarks from your website name and from association with
the personality test currently called “MBTI9000â€.
CPP hopes for your cooperation in this matter and is willing to work with you to resolve
these issues. However, if we do not hear from you by August 1st, 2011, CPP will contact
Lycos (Tripod) directly and request that your website be removed or blocked for violation of
CPP’s intellectual property rights.
Please contact me immediately with confirmation that you will abide by the requests
outlined in this letter. Again, feel free to contact me if you have any questions or if you need
assistance with any of CPP’s requests. I may be reached at
mam@cpp.com.
Sincerely,
Marie A. Murray
Director, Legal Operations
CPP, Inc.
mam@cpp.com
MBTI, Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, and Myers-Briggs are registered trademarks of the MBTI Trust, Inc.
The CPP logo is a registered trademark of CPP, Inc.
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Without the Wind Gauge nor Letter of Marque, it appears the good ship
Orion's Revenge stands no chance against the First Rate
HMS Corporate Victory.
So it seems I will shortly haul down the colors and prepare to offer Anal Osculation
:banghead: