Re: Use of trademark symbol - HELP!

["Ridder, Fred" <F -dot- Ridder -at- DIALOGIC -dot- COM>]

One argument against the style the lawyers are requesting is that
trademarks
are _always_ supposed to be used as adjectives.  If you insert the
trademark
ownership information right after the trademark, it comes between the
adjective
(the trademark itself) and the noun.  Trademark lawyers I've spoken to
have
been nearly unanimous that using trademarks as adjectives is very
important
to preventing "genericization" (e.g. "Kleenex(R) tissues" is good while
"a Kleenex" is not).

I've never seen the extreme style you mention in any printed
documentation.
Other posters have suggested that maybe the concern relates to PDF or
web delivery of documentation. But if you check the web sites of some
corporate giants I think you'll find no occurrence of this paranoid
approach
to trademarks.  In fact, on some sites you'll have a hard time finding
_any_
trademark ownership info, while on other sites everything is covered on
one
master page that each other page has a link to.

Fred Ridder  (mailto:f -dot- ridder -at- dialogic -dot- com)
Senior Technical Writer
Dialogic Corporation, Parsippany, NJ

And to keep our marketing people happy:
Get the Dialogic Edge at:  http://www.dialogic.com


>-----Original Message-----
>From:  Jim VanWinkle [SMTP:JamesPVW -at- AOL -dot- COM]
>Sent:  Monday, August 25, 1997 4:19 PM
>Subject:       Use of trademark symbol - HELP!
>
>I need some ammunition.
>
>At the request of my client's corporate lawyers, they have asked me to add
>the text "TM, Company Name, City, State" after EVERY occurence of the name of
>the software product I'm documenting.  That can be as much as five times per
>page!
>
>"ProductNameTM Company, Inc., Hoosville, MD, will display the Edit Layers
>dialog box, shown here."
>
>Ugh.
>
>I have explained that it is customary to use the trademark symbol at the
>first visible occurence of the product name and then list the trademark
>holder info along with the copyright statement on the back of the title page.
> My contact agrees with me, but says it will be a hard sell to the attorneys
>of this $80 billion company.
>
>So...
>
>Can anyone provide an argument besides "This is the way it's normally done"
>or "Other clients have had their attorneys review this style before and they
>have had no problems with it?"
>
>TIA,
>
>Jim Van Winkle
>

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