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James MacDougall wondered: <<According to the legal counsel at my
company, trademark restrictions require that every appearence of our
trademarked software's name be used as an adjective--an adjective
that modifies what the trademark was intended to identify.>>
Technically correct, but in practice... wrong, wrong, wrong! <g>
(Well, not so much wrong, as misleading.)
Check out how any large manufacturer (Microsoft, Adobe, etc.) handles
this and you'll see darned few TMs and (R)s anywhere... mostly in
branding information such as wordmarks and logos. As you'll see from
the examples in Microsoft and Adobe documentation, this is mostly for
marketing material, not for running text. For example, my online help
shows "Microsoft Word" with no trademark details anywhere except in
the wordmarks. If it's good enough for Microsoft...
Similarly, check out any computer magazine: the only place you'll see
trademark information is in the advertising. If Microsoft can't be
bothered sueing a rich outfit like Ziff-Davis over this shoddy
practice <g>, you can bet they don't have a legal leg to stand on.
Note that I'm not a lawyer, and am a not-a-Canadian-thus-not-an-
American-lawyer, treat my advice with appropriate skepticism. If your
legal counsel understands anything about intellectual property, ask
them to explain why Microsoft can do this (other than "because
they're Microsoft" <g>) and use that as your guide. If they can't
explain why, find another lawyer. <g> And if all else fails, never
argue with a lawyer: they fight dirty. <g> To wit:
<<For example, saying "SoftwareNameTM provides cool functionality"
doesn't fly. I must always say "The SoftwareNameTM software provides
cool functionality." This isn't something that I've seen in
documentation or marketing for other software. Is it familiar to
other writers out there who work with trademarked products?>>
The solution I always used was to identify the trademark clearly at
the start of the document, then blithely ignore it later. One good
way to safely ignore trademarks is to recognize the fact that in
documentation, you should be naming the product about 0.0001% as
often as you would do in marketing material. Focus on the tasks and
features, and you won't have to include many instances of the product
name... so if you do get stuck with the TM or (R), it should be a
rare bird.
----------------------------------------------------
-- Geoff Hart
ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca / geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com
www.geoff-hart.com
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