PC Valve Files for "DOTA" Trademark

[x3sphere]

<img class="wlDisabledImage" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; display: inline; border: 0px;" title="DOTA" src="http://x.exophase.net/images/2010/08/DOTA.jpg" border="0" alt="DOTA" width="600" height="171" />

Valve seems to have filed a trademark registration for the characters "DOTA." This is most likely referencing the popular <em>Warcraft III</em> custom map, <em>Defense of the Ancients (DotA)</em>. It is already known that the current designer of the map, IceFrog, was hired by Valve earlier last year and has been working on a yet unannounced project.

The <em>Defense of the Ancients</em> game is so popular that it provided for a free-to-play spin-off title, <em>League of Legends</em>, as developed by Riot Games[...]

Continue reading: Valve Files for &ldquo;DOTA&rdquo; Trademark...

 

[Zero]

I've heard about this, it's been happening for awhile now.

Valve playing with genres outside of First-Person Shooter? Alien Swarm is a Top-down, now an RTS? Portal itself loosely followed the atypical FPS style.

Could be interesting as to what will unfold.

 

[KezraPlanes]

I think it's good that Valve starts covering new ground.

I'll be eagerly waiting for whatever comes out.

 

[FrozenIpaq]

A followup that Joystiq did with some old developers of DotA: http://www.joystiq.com/2010/08/16/dota-developers-voice-concern-over-valves-dota-trademark/

They're opinion is basically the same as mine right now (something I immediately voiced to my friends who play the game): DotA is a community-driven and created game. For a company to come in and trademark a term they had no hand in creating just shouldn't happen. We, the community, created this term and wish for it to remain non-trademarked for free use of it.

 

[Serideth]

I hope this isn't a stupid question, but what exactly does this mean? I can't see it being a bad thing, Valve really do have the golden touch here and I'd be more inclined to focus on potential benefits from this.

 

[El Diablo]

With there already being Hon, LoL and DOTA how many more do they really need to make (assuming valve has plans to make a game or do something with it).

 

[FrozenIpaq]

I hope this isn't a stupid question, but what exactly does this mean? I can't see it being a bad thing, Valve really do have the golden touch here and I'd be more inclined to focus on potential benefits from this.

They're trademarking a community term. We, as the community (I'm a DotA player), feel that the term should not be trademarked by Valve. If it is, that means we are not to use the term (DOTA) anymore without risking complications with Valve and that leaves the fate of DotA on WC3 questionable. Sure, it's not officially called DotA in the map name, but everyone uses it to describe the map and no one fully spells it out anymore. There's no need for Valve to trademark the term, it's already a widely used term and well-established one at that. To trademark it would only hurt the community. Sure, Valve makes great games, but the fact of the matter is it's a community term that has remained unregistered/trademarked for years and the community, even the developers of the game, would like it to remain that way.

IMO: They shouldn't be able or allowed to use the DotA "term" without consent from the community and the original desginers/developers of the game (the original desginer and the one who coined the term hasn't even been around much, would be interesting to see what he has to say).

 

[Cloudy]

I still don't see the big deal. I understand why the community would be a little pissed though. However, I don't believe Valve would ask people to stop using the word

Besides, isn't there some sort of "prior use" challenge the community could do? Apparently, prior use applies even if the previous use of the trademark wasn't registered, at least in the US judging from my quick Google search.

What Valve is doing can't be all bad if IceFrog is on board.

Seems like a big fuss over nothing to me, but I'm not a member of the community so I can't really comment.

 

[x3sphere]

I'm not sure how having the name trademarked changes anything, really. Valve has never been known to interfere with community projects -- even those that use their IP. (see: Black Mesa). Most other developers would shut down a project like that in a heatbeat. Square Enix constantly goes after Chrono Trigger ROM hacks, for instance.

 

[Joey]

They're trademarking a community term. We, as the community (I'm a DotA player), feel that the term should not be trademarked by Valve. If it is, that means we are not to use the term (DOTA) anymore without risking complications with Valve and that leaves the fate of DotA on WC3 questionable. Sure, it's not officially called DotA in the map name, but everyone uses it to describe the map and no one fully spells it out anymore. There's no need for Valve to trademark the term, it's already a widely used term and well-established one at that. To trademark it would only hurt the community. Sure, Valve makes great games, but the fact of the matter is it's a community term that has remained unregistered/trademarked for years and the community, even the developers of the game, would like it to remain that way.

IMO: They shouldn't be able or allowed to use the DotA "term" without consent from the community and the original desginers/developers of the game (the original desginer and the one who coined the term hasn't even been around much, would be interesting to see what he has to say).

First off, there's nothing stopping YOU from calling the old mod "DotA". They can't litigate against people's conversations, especially about something that isn't an actual for sale product. Second, Valve can trademark it, as it isn't already trademarked. You snooze, you lose.

I don't really see what your concern is. How does this effect you, as a player? You can still play it, you can still talk about it. What's the problem?

 

[FrozenIpaq]

First off, there's nothing stopping YOU from calling the old mod "DotA". They can't litigate against people's conversations, especially about something that isn't an actual for sale product. Second, Valve can trademark it, as it isn't already trademarked. You snooze, you lose.

I don't really see what your concern is. How does this effect you, as a player? You can still play it, you can still talk about it. What's the problem?

I know we can still call it DotA.... It's just the principle I'm talking about. Sure, "we snooze we loose" but we never needed to trademark a community term. There's a strong community that follows the development of DotA and to this community Valve's attempt to trademark a term that they didn't coin is just upsetting. They don't deserve the trademark to that term. That's basically what I'm trying to get at. Why hasn't the community trademarked it then? It takes money and resources to file a trademark registration and frankly it's not something we should even have to worry about.

EDIT: To put it simply: it's principle

 

[Joey]

I know we can still call it DotA.... It's just the principle I'm talking about. Sure, "we snooze we loose" but we never needed to trademark a community term. There's a strong community that follows the development of DotA and to this community Valve's attempt to trademark a term that they didn't coin is just upsetting. They don't deserve the trademark to that term. That's basically what I'm trying to get at. Why hasn't the community trademarked it then? It takes money and resources to file a trademark registration and frankly it's not something we should even have to worry about.

EDIT: To put it simply: it's principle

Don't get me wrong, I completely get what you're saying. But at the end of the day, nothing really changes. You need to pick your battles in life, and in my opinion, this isn't really something to get worked up about. That's not to say I think you're really out of line, but I know gamer nerds... I can bet there's hundreds of people out their screaming their lungs out about this.

 

[Serideth]

Ok I got the complete wrong idea from this (my bad) I assumed Valve was trade marking it and going to churn out updates and what not. I don't see a big issue with this at all, sure it's petty to trademark a name you didn't come up with if you don't intend to do anything with it, but it's also petty to care if it changes nothing.

 

[FrozenIpaq]

I'm just saying I'm upset about this, nothing more. I know nothing will change, I'm just saying the principle of the whole thing is messed up and it annoys me at least to see Valve taking this kind of route. I'm not trying to battle anything here...I'm just expressing my feelings on the issue and how I feel it is wrong to the community to trademark something that the community coined and potentially profit off of it (Heroes of Newerth is a paid version of DotA but they aren't using the DotA name). In an ideal world I would love them to ask the original creator, Eul, to use the term "DotA" since he is the one who created "Defense of the Ancients". I know this is a battle that can't be won or something that's is very minuscule but expression isn't bad either.

 

[x3sphere]

I agree on the principal thing, but from a business standpoint it makes sense to do this. It protects Valve from any possible liability issues as they have a designer from the mod on the team. That's probably why they did it.

 

[FrozenIpaq]

I agree on the principal thing, but from a business standpoint it makes sense to do this. It protects Valve from any possible liability issues as they have a designer from the mod on the team. That's probably why they did it.

Glad no one is pointing out my improper spelling of "principle" in my context. I know where Valve is coming from which is why I can understand what they're doing but it still upsets me Although I've moved on from DotA to Heroes of Newerth for greener pastures, so the name is all but a memory