Per comments from Holmes himself, the idea for the name had nothing to do with Tolkien’s works, nor the movie. It was instead to denote royalty and lordship. I have seen nothing in any of the reporting to indicate that this had to do with anything other than the name of the food truck. The truck wasn’t going to be themed after the books or films. There wasn’t going to be any trade dress or vehicle wraps harkening back to those works of fiction. There wasn’t to be a flavor of chicken called “One wing to rule them all.”
So trademark holders being douchebags as usual. The Lord of the Rings isn’t associated with chicken wings in anyway so how could consumers be confused?
That argument would be more persuasive if it was “Lord of Wings.”
Agreed.
Confusion isn’t the only issue. There’s also trademark dilution.
So wait, is “Lord of” anything a violation of the copyright or is it just words that rhyme with “rings”?
Either way it seems pretty ridiculous.Michael flatley is fucked!
The funny thing is Lord if the Rings is actually public domain in New Zealand as of January this year.
Time to rename to “Token Wings” after the Token Ring network topology.
They probably want to, but it’s not their turn to ask yet.
Ehhh…I could see this if it was book or reading related or if they are using a Wizard or the like eating wings in their logo.
But otherwise this is a far stretch.
Satire isn’t protected in New Zealand?
Don’t have much knowledge of NZ laws, but they certainly have a vested interest in keeping the Tolkien estate happy. Whether they have prior laws to support that, or there was pressure from the top in this case, it tracks that the lawsuit ended like this.
I don’t think a food truck counts as satire. Satire is like the “Bored of the Rings” Lampoon book from the '70s, it actually had something to say regarding the material it was satirical of.
I may be underestimating the satirical capacity of a food truck, or maybe the legal definition of satire in NZ, but to me it’s just a cheeky name.
That’s a great chicken truck name!
I want to say this was an obvious outcome. But I guess it is an unrelated industry. However I don’t buy that you come up with lord of the wings and think that it’s so original and so unrelated and so obviously has to do wth lordship and royalty.
