It’s been a while since the Lab went near the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for a fresh trademark registration, but it went back again in March, and I tossed it into my slush pile, where it has sat for some time now, waiting for me to get to it.
There’s not really a whole lot to go on here, anyway. Not much more than a name.
The trademark (serial number 85559233, which was filed on behalf of the Lab by James Cady at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP, as usual) is DIO – which I imagine probably stands for something. If you’d like to amuse yourself in the comments suggesting options, feel free.
The scope for the trademark is:
IC 009. US 021 023 026 036 038. G & S: Computer game software
IC 041. US 100 101 107. G & S: Entertainment services, namely, providing an online computer game; entertainment services, namely, providing virtual environments in which users can interact through social games for recreational, leisure or entertainment purposes
The trademark basis is 1B, so it doesn’t involve something that has seen commercial use yet.
Education time. If you don’t care to have a lesson on the difference between the 1A and the 1B trademark basis, skip down to the next horizontal line.
A trademark can have a basis of 1A or 1B (it can actually be 44D or 44E instead, if it is a foreign trademark – but those need not concern us, today).
So, what’s the difference between a 1A trademark and a 1B trademark? Well, trademark protection becomes automatic when you first use a trademark in commerce. You don’t quite get the full gamut of legal protections until it is registered, but you get most of the benefits as soon as you’ve got a receipt that shows that money changed hands for some goods/services branded by and within the scope of the trademark.
The USPTO, therefore, traditionally deals with trademarks that have already been used. Those trademarks are 1A.
This is what it has to say in the filing guidance about the 1A basis:
Choose this basis if you are actually already using the mark in commerce that the U.S. Congress may regulate (e.g., interstate commerce; territorial commerce [with Guam or American Samoa, e.g.]; or commerce between the United States and a foreign country) in connection with ALL the goods and/or services identified in the application. You must be able to provide the date of first use anywhere and the date of use in commerce that the U.S. Congress may regulate, and a specimen (sample) of said use. Use may be by the applicant, the applicant’s related company, or a licensee of the applicant (or, earlier use by a predecessor in interest; however, current use must be being made at the time of the application by the applicant, the applicant’s related company, or a licensee of applicant).
The 1B trademark is quite a bit newer, and originally the USPTO didn’t deal with them. That was added rather later. The 1B basis allows you to essentially reserve a trademark that you haven’t used commercially yet. It’s supposed to be in good faith, so it predicates on you not just filing an application for something to be a dick about it by blocking someone else.
Here’s what the USPTO says about 1B:
Choose this basis if you have not yet made actual use of the mark in commerce that the U.S. Congress may regulate (i.e., interstate commerce; territorial commerce [with Guam or American Samoa, e.g.]; or commerce between the United States and a foreign country) in connection with ALL the goods and/or services identified in the application, but instead simply have a bona fide (good faith) intention to use the mark in commerce at a later time after filing of this application. The intention to use may be by the applicant, the applicant’s related company, or the licensee of the applicant.
The odds are that the DIO trademark is for an upcoming, non-Second-Life product, but I don’t expect to get a “no additional information at this time/no-comment” back from the Lab any earlier than tomorrow, so you can all start speculating, if you like. When I get something, I’ll post an update.
UPDATE: Miro Collas has employed Google to find a password-protected signup page for what looks like the staging server for DIO. Thanks, Miro!
UPDATE: Only the password protection doesn’t work if you’re using (say) Linux. So here’s a couple photos.
UPDATE: The Dio staging/test server has now been closed off, and Linden Lab expresses thanks for the notice of the security issue. Linden Lab also adds that yes, it is not ready to talk about it in any detail other than that it will be something new and completely separate from and unrelated to Second Life and that it is not yet ready for public consumption.
DIO, hmm? Well, it makes sense. Since the Lindens are grid gods DIO fits with them. In Italian it means god….
Perhaps they read my blog (Save Second Life again) and have taken up on my suggestion.
[quote]How about creating a games platform based on Secondlife and the LL viewer? Use resident competencies to build and maintain.
Remember that company they bought a little while ago? Wasn’t it text adventure publishing or something?
To reiterate a favorite theme of mine:
Why the ^&$@! does not LL license the “eye in had” logo for use in RL products? What an amazing conversation starter that would be for us. And a way for us to recognize each other in RL if we choose.
I know, this is a different Trademark/Logo but it serves to remind me of one of my pet peeves.
I’ve been wearing a RL SL logo silver pendant around my neck for years. I have never ever encountered a person who knew what it even was, let alone anyone starting a conversation about it. SL is a niche product only a very small amount of people use.
UPDATE: Miro Collas has employed Google to find a password-protected signup page for what looks like the staging server for DIO. Thanks, Miro!
If you want to try to figure it out I found a backronym generator here:
http://www.opbarnes.com/revacron/revacron.php
I wonder if the Ronnie James Dio estate will have a problem with this trademark? I guess it doesn’t matter unless LL wants to form a heavy metal band. At this point nothing would surprise me. I could totally see Rod Humble in a spandex jumpsuit with flames on it shredding on a guitar with Torley on keyboards playing some 80s style metal ballad… “we’re working on the marketplace… your transactions aren’t safe… wait for purchases all your life… it cuts like a knife” (something is always like a knife in metal ballads).
@Sarge: I expect it is likely something to do with that.
@Shug: Linden Lab did do that for a while, and licensed the trademark to a jewellery-maker called First Bling, which made pewter eye-in-hand pendants. At the time it generated quite a bit of controversy and complaints.
From the source code of the page that Miro passed on:
Dio Stories: Dio allows you to create and play user created stories.
… actually, someone’s bollixed up the security settings a little on the basic page, as well as on the assets share that it references:
http://object-assets-baron.s3.amazonaws.com/image/4f73534307cb2096ac000002/4f7357b007cb2096ad000004.jpeg
http://object-assets-baron.s3.amazonaws.com/image/4f73534307cb2096ac000002/4f73579c07cb2096ac000007_full.jpg
http://object-assets-baron.s3.amazonaws.com/image/4f73534307cb2096ac000002/4f73584907cb2096ad000007_full.jpg
http://object-assets-baron.s3.amazonaws.com/image/4f762962d93d0576d9000001/4fb6f085bebe225b8c000001_full.jpg
Placeholders? I don’t know.
What else is in here? Gynoid’s Laboratory, and Bubblesort’s Place. Hmmm.
Also references to http://www.dio.com and endless.lindenlab.com
No, someone didn’t set up the security right on the Web-server. It’s pretty much giving everything away at this point, if only you bother to ask it.
A reminder to DIO beta-testers, of course, is that you’re still under NDA and so you can’t talk about it – so please don’t. Until the Lab fixes up the staging-server security, though, the rest of us can leaf through the site and glean information from it, anyway. If you’re running Linux, the site doesn’t send you an authentication challenge to keep you out.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bwimb
Baron Bwimb of Ooze, known as Nakimas to the Suel, was the self-proclaimed baron of the Paraelemental Plane of Ooze, in the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. He died in circa 589 CY. His symbol was a black sphere.
http://dio.baron.ooze.lindenlab.com/stories/4fbbd9c3bebe222f98000001
My lips are sealed… even though everybody here can apparently see what I’m seeing, LOL
Me, I want to go on the burrito quest…
i’m not talking. i don’t know nothing anywayz.
Has anyone said “viral marketing” yet?
But see diogames.com because it makes me wonder if the trademark can be secured for computer games in general. That first part of the scope looks a bit too wide. On the other hand, you see the same pattern in patent applications.
[...] Tateru has reported on a new trademark being registered by Linden Research Inc. You can find the full details on her site, but the key point is that it is for an entirely new product – called Dio (which, among other things, Wikipedia points-out is the Italian name for “God”). [...]
Lol im reminded of this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enbrqRnJh7o&t=4m3s
Looks like an attempt to make a web-based SL with no 3D; it ends up looking like a retarded G+.
Especially stupid because the web now *has* pretty good 3D, at least as good as SL’s renderer.
From the limited descriptions we’ve had through the year, I’d say this is not an attempt to make anything like SL.
Rumor has it that Greece will drop the Euro and adopt the L$ as its national currency…. Operation Dio!
[...] So, about this Dio thing… [...]
II do love that they have ‘ooze’ on the name of the location that this information is leaking out from.
Well, I’ve logged into it. Looked around and it’s little more than a chat program that lets you create chat rooms. Very innovative considering there is clearly a need on the internet for more chat rooms…
I would say it is a platform for social games. But since there are so many out there already and the big hype on facebook games is long over, I really hope it is a platform for user-generated social games. A toolkit to build them. So similar to Second Life, but not a virtual world, but a social games platform. Great would be if you could embed them in any website. That would mean huge new oportunities for Second Life content creators and have also a big impact on SL, which would be kind of the big brother of that platform.
I have one slight problem with what’s known about this so far.
I despise reading dense text on a computer / laptop, even a mobile device like an iPhone is pushing it. It hurts my eyes after a while, actual physical pain. I’m sure this is why boffins created that epaper stuff.
Apparently I’m the only person whose first thoughts are of “Tenacious D and the Pick of Destiny”, or at least the first person who will openly admit to such thoughts. “Dio can you help me? I am lost and all alone…” Having a hard time taking this product name seriously to be honest.
You know what they say about product names … “all the good ones are taken”
buffoons should be investing in SL. doh! The rest of us read the writing on the wall. LL has abandoned SL.
While I greatly enjoyed Indigo pointing out that “Dio” is “God” in Italian (and I would not put it past LL to have realized that already…)
I’m rough-guessing DIO means “Do It Online”… especially given LL’s affection for using innuendo and even blatant sex to sell everything they make.
Other options that hit me:
Drama Is Online
Dangling In Obscurity
DRM Is Owned
Dioxyribonucleicacid Is Overrated
Well, maybe not those four. It’s probably something less sensible. : )
Diorama
This will bomb but I’m sure you didn’t hear it here first. Even if it were the greatest thing, Linden Lab can’t market themselves out of a wet paper bag.
Looks as inspiring as Diaspora.
Wheeeeeeee.
Could this be related to the acquisition of LittleTextPeople?
Looks like it’s been taken down. Too bad they couldn’t be bothered to at least email us to tell us they’re taking it down or ask for our feedback on the project. Darnit, I made two spaces in there… one had a cornfield and a grue in a dark room and a princess to rescue and the other was based on the song Istanbul.
It was a buggy web based MUD designer web site. You could only add rooms, which was great but the add objects feature was broken so you couldn’t add characters or lock doors or things like that. You could not add a door to a room you already made when adding a door either. When you made a door you had to make a whole new room then go back and link the door to the room you wanted it to go to, change the settings on the door and go back and delete the empty room you made when you originally made the door. That was a pain in the butt. To trap people in the cornfield I linked a door to itself.
Oh noes, am I violating an NDA? NDAs are srs bzns, LOL. It was a click through contract so whatever it said it’s not binding, even if it was an NDA like what the people above posted. It could have been a Charles Dickens novel for all I know. TL;DR
http://i.imgur.com/yZHST.gif
At the very least you risk not being accepted for early previews of their next stuff…
That’s not much of a risk. They never accept me for anything like that anyway.
I wonder if Dio has anything to do with Sunglass? Rosedale and Kapor are both involved in Sunglass, and it’s also web based. Maybe dio is some kind of storytelling layer they are putting on top of the Sunglass web based 3D modeller to create a virtual world that can be accessed through a web browser:
http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/general-sl-discussion/73117-sl-board-members-fund-web.html
@fogwoman If so, that makes Emily Short “Madre de DIO”, I should think.
@bubblesort It’s been ruled (more than once) under US law that such click-through contracts are no more nor less binding than the sort that comes on paper. Yes, they’re contracts of adhesion, but that in itself does not invalidate them. Like any other contract, the written terms determine the validity.
For the legal rulings, you can refer to Feldman v. Google, Inc., Hotmail Corp. v. Van$ Money Pie, and even Bragg v. Linden Research, Inc. if you want something closer to home.
As for the Sunglass thing, I think it is unlikely. Neither Kapor nor Rosedale seem to be involved in Second Life anymore. Nor have their other financial interests or investments ended up integrated (or even much connected) with SL.
UPDATE: The Dio staging/test server has now been closed off, and Linden Lab expresses thanks for the notice of the security issue. Linden Lab also adds that yes, it is not ready to talk about it in any detail other than that it will be something new and completely separate from and unrelated to Second Life and that it is not yet ready for public consumption.
Worth noting Linden Lab is still a company that employs no artists, game designer, no sound engineers, no writers (‘cept Emily I guess and whoever else from the LittleTextPeople acquisition that fits). Nor is their careers page advertising for any.
So what this product is rumored to be shouldn’t be surprising. The other projects they’re working on are also probably just platforms for user-created content ontop of mechanics their engineers concoct. Whether future projects are just text or like Second Life require users create 99.9% of everything with visuals or sounds, Linden Lab is still a company that can only produce these kind of products.
That isn’t entirely true though. It’s possible they’ve hired a whole team of artists without advertising it on their site. It’s possible they’ve contracted outside studios to handle art for other products. But as far as present evidence goes I wouldn’t expect Linden Lab to be working on any visual game not entirely dependent upon user-created content, they don’t seem to have the ingredients to do that.
/me votes with Wayfinder – Do It Online
Tateru: “UPDATE: The Dio staging/test server has now been closed off, and Linden Lab expresses thanks for the notice of the security issue. Linden Lab also adds that yes, it is not ready to talk about it in any detail other than that it will be something new and completely separate from and unrelated to Second Life and that it is not yet ready for public consumption.”
An unusual and refreshingly candid reply from LL, in which they 1) acknowledge a security issue and thank us for hack… uh… exposing it and 2) No, they’re not yet ready to talk, but it’s unrelated to Second Life and is in production stage.
Know what, I can live with that. At least this time they had the good sense to respond in a polite and respectful manner. I have to view that as a step up.
Ezra: I wouldn’t expect Linden Lab to be working on any visual game not entirely dependent upon user-created content, they don’t seem to have the ingredients to do that.
Yeah, I’d have to agree there Ezra. LL is an odd company that has created the foundation of what we need to make an incredibly amazing product, then amazingly has hobbled us every step of the way. Strange combination that… giving people an immense and creative playground, then destroying our efforts one by one as we play. Hopefully in this new venture they’ll re-think their management process.
There’s just one thing I know for a certainty: no matter what this new venture of theirs is, no matter what they tout, present, offer… being connected with the name Linden Lab I plan to steer far away from it and have no intention of investing a minute of time or a dime of money into the system. I don’t care if their TOS is in contract form and iron clad, not going near it… not after what I saw them do to Second Life.
@Wayfinder
“…and 2) No, they’re not yet ready to talk, but it’s unrelated to Second Life and is in production stage”
I think you mean development stage, right?
Yes Tigro, you’re correct… development stage. If that. At this point might even be “duck, LL is ‘thinking’ again” stage. ; )
doubtlessly DIO is just a typo and stands for Dil
okioki, but what i simply do not get why they haven’t looked some around (or better gave the job to one who knows to do) to avoid stupid mistakes. If we launch any more as a local greengrocer its alway good to take some research before deciding naming-thingies.
yes, now we doubtlessly know:
LL will feature with this Tokyo band (which is ‘not directly’ my music, but i am sure their fans know how good their band is): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wm1Du2uTa9c&feature=channel&list=UL
What Ezra says about LL not employing artists and the like may not be entirely correct, but they’re not likely to be salaried staff. Maybe contractors such as the LDPW Moles? I’ve got a definite feeling, after Oz Linden went silly about Qarl’s deformer, that they don’t grok artists. Or volunteers.
[...] Linden Lab trademarks DIO [...]
[...] – Linden Lab trademarks DIO – Mobile new stuff – Speculation – Discussion on tablet play and immersion, or lack of [...]
[...] .buttons { float: left; margin: 4px 4px 4px 4px; } The ever-vigilant Tateru Nino has a great piece on a new trademark registered by Linden Lab. Sounds like the casual gaming approach is about to come to the fore at Linden [...]
[...] The remaining two of the four non-Second Life products are due to be revealed before the end of the year, at least one of which is probably going to be Dio (or whatever its final name is) which we got an unexpected look at earlier this year. [...]