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Who owns the "multiball" trademark?
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<blockquote data-quote="Zombie Aladdin" data-source="post: 144799" data-attributes="member: 4242"><p>The word "bumper" IS generic, but "jet bumper," "thumper bumper," and "pop bumper" are not. That I know; you can see how what they're referred to falls right in line with the company that made the machine. (To my knowledge, "active bumper" is not trademarked.) Jersey Jack avoided this issue with <em>The Wizard of Oz</em> by referring to its active bumpers as those haunted trees and the area as the "Haunted Forest." Gottlieb attempted to trademark the word "flipper" but couldn't as some other company had claimed it. After that company went defunct, "flipper" became genericized.</p><p></p><p>Williams was actually quite the patent troll in the '90s and has held on to some of these patents, trademarks, and copyrights for a while now. For instance, do you see those metal plates connecting the floor of the playfield to ramps with one groove cut out to the side? You can see it on tables like <em>Medieval Madness</em>. Williams patented that and owns the patent to this day. (Because people need these parts to properly restore and repair Williams machines, the patent is allowed to remain active.) The metal plate was designed to slant the ball's trajectory away from the center drain and towards a flipper. This is why other companies had to come up with other mechanisms to do that. Stern, for instance, has a tiny metal wire that sticks out, which absorbs the momentum on one side of the ball. (This can be seen in front of the bell on all versons of <em>AC/DC</em>, for instance.)</p><p></p><p>This patent trolling led me to believe Williams still owned the trademark and that Stern and Jersey Jack had to pay some amount to use the word, which would be worth it, presumably, because "multiball" is something everybody is familiar with and is a major draw for public play. But the entries for "M-Ball" and "Tri-Ball" indicate that Data East eventually took the trademark from Williams. From what I can see, Jack Guarnieri is not on good terms with Gary Stern, and it'd be, as I can't think of a better phrase for it, out of character for him to pay Stern to use something they own. That leads me to believe "multiball" has either become genericized, or its trademark is not enforced.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Zombie Aladdin, post: 144799, member: 4242"] The word "bumper" IS generic, but "jet bumper," "thumper bumper," and "pop bumper" are not. That I know; you can see how what they're referred to falls right in line with the company that made the machine. (To my knowledge, "active bumper" is not trademarked.) Jersey Jack avoided this issue with [i]The Wizard of Oz[/i] by referring to its active bumpers as those haunted trees and the area as the "Haunted Forest." Gottlieb attempted to trademark the word "flipper" but couldn't as some other company had claimed it. After that company went defunct, "flipper" became genericized. Williams was actually quite the patent troll in the '90s and has held on to some of these patents, trademarks, and copyrights for a while now. For instance, do you see those metal plates connecting the floor of the playfield to ramps with one groove cut out to the side? You can see it on tables like [i]Medieval Madness[/i]. Williams patented that and owns the patent to this day. (Because people need these parts to properly restore and repair Williams machines, the patent is allowed to remain active.) The metal plate was designed to slant the ball's trajectory away from the center drain and towards a flipper. This is why other companies had to come up with other mechanisms to do that. Stern, for instance, has a tiny metal wire that sticks out, which absorbs the momentum on one side of the ball. (This can be seen in front of the bell on all versons of [i]AC/DC[/i], for instance.) This patent trolling led me to believe Williams still owned the trademark and that Stern and Jersey Jack had to pay some amount to use the word, which would be worth it, presumably, because "multiball" is something everybody is familiar with and is a major draw for public play. But the entries for "M-Ball" and "Tri-Ball" indicate that Data East eventually took the trademark from Williams. From what I can see, Jack Guarnieri is not on good terms with Gary Stern, and it'd be, as I can't think of a better phrase for it, out of character for him to pay Stern to use something they own. That leads me to believe "multiball" has either become genericized, or its trademark is not enforced. [/QUOTE]
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Who owns the "multiball" trademark?
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