Disney: IP Troll

Two days after an elite group of the US military, known as Seal Team Six, killed Osama bin Laden, Disney filed three separate applications to trademark the name:

In a perfect example of a big media company looking to capitalize on current events, The Walt Disney Company has trademarked “Seal Team 6"... Disney’s trademark applications for “Seal Team 6″ cover clothing, footwear, headwear, toys, games and “entertainment and education services,” among other things.

First, before I get to the point, I disagree with the term "capitalize" in the block quote above. This is no more an example of capitalism than our public schools.

As I pointed out in a previous post, IP Trolls are persons or companies who buy up or file for exclusive rights in order to receive a government grant of monopoly privileges to lock out competition and sue the bejeezus out of anyone who tries to compete. Disney is clearly being an IP Troll. They have no reasonable claim to the term "Seal Team Six," nor any projects previously in the works that could justify such a claim. They learned about this team they way everybody else in America did, on the news.

The Navy has taken notice and filed their own applications, though their a little slower on the uptake. Will this be the end of Disney's money grab? Probably not, says William McGeveran, a law professor at the University of Minnesota:

Disney may get approval, but what’s more likely to happen... is that Disney and the Navy will reach some kind of mutually beneficial agreement. Law enforcement agencies, such as the New York City Police Department, make such arrangements, lending out their trademark or cars, in exchange for compensation or script approval.... He could imagine that Disney might want to make a movie or TV show based on SEAL Team 6 and would strike some kind of deal with the Navy.

This is not an unusual practice. Large corporations that own a lot of copyrights have been known to sue each other and then work out an agreement to where they can both have access to each others copyrights, reducing competition even further.

Also, in the celebratory spirit of the aftermath of bin Laden's death, merchandise galore popped up with the term on them. Now, there is a possibility that these people could be sued in the future.

Welcome to America. Land of the free. If you have really good lawyers. (I exaggerate, but only slightly)

 

Amerinese Water Torture and the Cognitive Dissonance of Spreading Democracy

The death of Osama bin Laden and the Republican primary debate last night have reignited the debate on waterboarding. When asked to raise their hands if they supported the resumption of waterboarding under any circumstance they can think of Tim Pawlenty, Hermann Cain, and Rick Santorum aired out their armpits. (It gets hot under those lights.) Ron Paul and Gary Johnson refused to join the stink fest.

Of course, it was never called torture. It was referred to as "enhanced interrogation." Though, as any 8 year old boy knows, euphemisms are only used when we know we're doing something we're not supposed to be doing. "No sir, I don't know how he got that bloody lip and black eye. We were just 'playing'." This is akin to saying, "Oh that chinese water thing. That's just some drops on the forehead."

When the Japanese and German military performed this "enhanced interrogation" technique during WWII we cried foul. And rightly so. But when we do it, we turn a blind eye.

The crux of the matter is the cognitive dissonance we have when it comes to our team doing the dirty deeds. Last September Bryan Caplan, who blogs at EconLog, asked, "When Are We the Bad Guys?"

"OK, what would we have to do to be the bad guys?"  And my claim is that group-serving bias makes us quick to clear us and condemn them. (emphasis in original)

Last night, Tim Pawlenty said, "There is a group of radical jihadists, and we need to call them by name. And they believe it is okay to kill innocent people in the name of their religion." He's right. It's not okay to kill innocent people for your cause. And Al Qaeda killed 3,000 people on 9/11. And through other attacks have killed more.

But we have gone around the world and, at current count, according to the Iraq Body Count Project, have killed somewhere between 98,170 — 107,152 innocent people in the name of our form of democracy. That's more than 30 times the amount Al Qaeda have killed, yet we still see ourselves as righteous.

Even now, I experience this cognitive dissonance and group serving bias. Thinking of 9/11 makes me feel wronged, personally. As if the attacks were carried out on my family. I don't feel the same way when I think of those others killed. Even though logically I know I should feel 30 times as worse, that was them. 9/11 was us.

bin Laden: Dead but Not Gone

Radley Balko has verbalized what I was feeling this morning.

Yes, bin Laden the man is dead. But he achieved all he set out to achieve, and a hell of a lot more. He forever changed who we are as a country, and for the worse. Mostly because we let him. That isn’t something a special ops team can fix.

There are a lot of bullet points that detail the way America has been changed for the worse, such as the TSA and unilateral executions. Read the whole thing here.

This is why I didn't find myself overly exuberant and joining in the White House party.