Well, I think (but don't quote me on this) you can use the name as long as you don't sell your comics. Sorry, that is all I (think I) know. :l
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What names are you looking into and *are they actually listed as trademarks or just copyrights of old not-in-production comics*?
Little tiny black and white books that may have come out in the 80s are not likely to have people who made a shred of money off them and *could never* have afforded to trademark their characters. (It's quite expensive.) If you find someone that's got a name like your character's, look the publisher up. Find out if they're out of business, if someone owns the rights to that character, etc.
It IS up to them to pursue their copyrights. Not you. If you've made the effort and come to the conclusion that the character hasn't been in print for 40 years and *no one currently owns them*, it's a safe bet no one will *ever* know. If the *owner* comes along, and you can still prove you tried to find who held the copyright (which DOES expire.... eventually... darn Sonny Bono and Disney) maybe you might work something out either way.
Change a letter or two. Spell it differently. Take a thesaurus to heart and use foreign languages in choosing names. But try not to step on toes, still, you can find a way to get your book out there.
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Copyright wise...
You cannot copyright a name.
You could make "Wolverine" as long as the character is *ALOT* different than the X-men character.
That said - trademarks might be another story - I don't know so very much about them. But copyrightwise you should be completely and utterly safe; especially from obscure and minor characters.
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Yup which is why I say look for the trademark. "Copyright violations" would include using a character similar enough that it MIGHT actually 'be' the older, unused character. But yes, trademark is the valid point here. If you didn't spend the $$$ to get a TM slapped on the LOGO, NAME and IMAGE of the character (which is what you'd want to do), the copyright on the final package won't mean diddly if someone else uses a name.
It's why a lot of novelists had to rethink their one-name-worlds (Pern for instance, had to become Dragonriders of Pern to be considered a single copyrighted/trademarked name.) The logo, look, and name all in one constitutes what you'd want to set up a TM. The coypright applies *only to the finished product*.
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In my stupidity, I typed copyright when I meant trademark.
But it sounds like my question was answered. Thanks.
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yup - it's very confusing, I often use one when I mean the other too.
Trademarks are only considered active for around 10 years. That's why every 8 years or so, Marvel drags out Howard the Duck, to (for some inexplicable reason) keep the trademark active on him.
A lot of tm's are "dead", either never actually put into use or expired for one reason or another. There is precident already set *in the comic industry* for 'taking over' an actual property trademark (witness what happened with Robotech? yup, that was a lost property because of inaction on Macek's part. good.) but what I gather from yours it won't matter much because you're not like, "redoing" an old character.
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So I'm thinking about writing some comics with a friend. But every time I go online to check to see if some name is in use by a professional comic company, I find some minor, obscure character with the name I want to use.
Does anyone happen to know what the copyright issues are with naming characters the same thing, if conceptually they're different (for example, with two Captain Marvels, do DC and Marvel have some agreement, or what)?
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