Monster Energy Harass Game Devs & Indies Who Use The Word "Monster" By Abusing Trademark Complaints

[killamch89]

I'm curious as to why it's only gaming companies they're going after? I think the only reason they're doing this is because most gaming companies don't have the funding to keep going back and forth with monster in court as that would likely be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. What are your thoughts on this whole fiasco?

 

[Reality vs Adventure]

This is very strange; I don't even know what to say. There should be laws against abusing their right to sue. What is even more interesting are the judges who hear these cases. If it is a garbage case, then why are they hearing it instead of dismissing the lawsuit.  A judge needs to slap a fine on Monster Energy for litigation abuse, if that is the correct term. Makes you wonder why they are going after gaming companies. Are they being vindictive for not getting a contract with gaming companies? Are they targeting potential competitors in the gaming industry so as to gain more favor from another gaming company? Why would they be angering an industry that advertises their product? Or is that just how low their brand has become? 

[The Blackangel]

This is such bullshit. They can't trademark/copyright a word that has been in the English language since LONG before they existed. For thousands of years that word has been around. Monster Energy is what, 20 years old? And on top of that are they going to try to trademark/copyright it in all languages, or just English?

Spanish - monstruo
French - monstre
Irish - ollphéist
Scottish - uilebheist
Maori - taniwha
Icelandic - skrímsli

 

This is some serious snowflake bullshit. You can't copyright a word if you didn't invent it. If they were called gooberflabben, they could probably trademark/copyright. The only thing they can actually trademark/copyright is their god damn logo.

[killamch89]

On 5/5/2023 at 3:39 PM, Reality vs Adventure said:

This is very strange; I don't even know what to say. There should be laws against abusing their right to sue. What is even more interesting are the judges who hear these cases. If it is a garbage case, then why are they hearing it instead of dismissing the lawsuit.  A judge needs to slap a fine on Monster Energy for litigation abuse, if that is the correct term. Makes you wonder why they are going after gaming companies. Are they being vindictive for not getting a contract with gaming companies? Are they targeting potential competitors in the gaming industry so as to gain more favor from another gaming company? Why would they be angering an industry that advertises their product? Or is that just how low their brand has become? 

That's my problem with this - what's the point? They're not really achieving anything noteworthy by doing this and creating more enemies across the board is very stupid. The whole other reason I'm stumped is because a lot of smaller gaming companies ie: Indie operate at losses so Monster Energy Drink won't gain much profit from suing even hundreds of them.

On 5/6/2023 at 4:37 PM, The Blackangel said:

This is such bullshit. They can't trademark/copyright a word that has been in the English language since LONG before they existed. For thousands of years that word has been around. Monster Energy is what, 20 years old? And on top of that are they going to try to trademark/copyright it in all languages, or just English?

Spanish - monstruo
French - monstre
Irish - ollphéist
Scottish - uilebheist
Maori - taniwha
Icelandic - skrímsli

 

This is some serious snowflake bullshit. You can't copyright a word if you didn't invent it. If they were called gooberflabben, they could probably trademark/copyright. The only thing they can actually trademark/copyright is their god damn logo.

If I remember correctly, there are certain words that are too popular to be copyrighted by any company so this shouldn't be happening. Monster Energy Drinks is just going after English named products that use the name Monster. It absolutely makes no sense.

[Shortie]

I find this disgusting if I am honest, the fact that they are able to harass game companies like they are doing because they have used the word Monster in their games is just ridiculous and wrong. 

So what about any other companies away from gaming who use the word Monster? Not going after them? This is seriously messed up and definitely an act of abuse as they know that game companies will not have the money to as you say, keep going back and forth. 

[killamch89]

On 5/12/2023 at 12:05 PM, Shortie said:

I find this disgusting if I am honest, the fact that they are able to harass game companies like they are doing because they have used the word Monster in their games is just ridiculous and wrong. 

So what about any other companies away from gaming who use the word Monster? Not going after them? This is seriously messed up and definitely an act of abuse as they know that game companies will not have the money to as you say, keep going back and forth. 

The whole thing makes no sense because they aren't going after companies in other sectors that have Monster in their name so I'm curious why it's only the gaming industry they're terrorizing.

[Shagger]

This is ridiculous. Nobody is going to mistake a drink for a video game.

[LeoGrun]

If this is sincere... Monster fundamentally misunderstands trademarks. You trademark something for a particular use or purpose. Monster energy drink-- if anything!-- would have a trademark to use 'Monster' potentially in food and beverage. Someone would have had to grant them a trademark to make... animals I guess? Maybe to produce artistic renderings of real and fantasy creatures? So, no one else could sell a drink or possibly a food called 'Monster'. Unless they've been granted that second use for... producing artistic renderings of animals, I guess. Hey, maybe they do have that-- if so, why?

What they are thinking of is copyright which is a different thing entirely and you can't copyright a single word.*

*Well, usually. Someone tried to apply copyright to the word supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, and while you can copyright a musical composition and lyrics and a performance you can't copyright an individual word or title.

[Shortie]

On 5/17/2023 at 9:29 PM, killamch89 said:

The whole thing makes no sense because they aren't going after companies in other sectors that have Monster in their name so I'm curious why it's only the gaming industry they're terrorizing.

It completely baffles me. In most cases you would think it would be due to competition but competition for what, they create games and you create a drink, why the issue with the use of the word Monster because it's the name of your popular drink. 

I feel a lot of the time, companies like this try to get greedy and when they do, they start to take advantage and we get this abuse of trademarks.