Futuremark tries to trademark ‘Pwnage’

Really whats next?
Futuremark tries to trademark ?Pwnage? | News | Custom PC

Pure Pwnage - 'taking n00bs to school since 2004'

purepwnage is planning to take legal action as they have had Pwnage products since 2004.

purepwnage response below

computer game software; computer game programs; computer game discs; multimedia software recorded on CD-ROM featuring fictional characters and computer games; downloadable ring tones, graphics and music via global computer network and wireless devices; pre-recorded DVD's, video tapes, laser discs featuring movies about fictional characters, and pre-recorded compact discs featuring music; motion picture films on fictional characters

The purpose of a trademark is to differentiate one company's products and intellectual property from another's. If Futuremark were to use 'Pwnage' as a trademark in the above classes of wares there would be confusion, not differentiation, when you consider our show and its related products. The Pure Pwnage season 1 DVD and the Pure Pwnage season 1 soundtrack are examples of current products bearing the name "Pwnage" that fall in the above classes. Is Futuremark planning to make a "Pwnage" movie? I know that we are planning to make a movie based the show and it would sure be nice if we could call it, well, "Pure Pwnage".

According to a Futuremark response to the controversy their purpose for filing is simply to "protect ourselves from squatters (or what I call campers) - people looking to trademark the name on false pretenses, just to make a claim against Futuremark Games Studio for its use." After consulting with the ROFLMAO legal team I learned that this is a poor reason to file. Protection against squatters is built into the trademark system. If you don't use your trademark, you will lose it.

If it is possible to trademark 'Pwnage', should the mark belong to Futuremark?

pwnage - Google Search

I got bored and stopped looking, but maybe someone could tell me on which results page the first Futuremark website appears (if you have a Google SOAP API Key you could try this).
Hmm, I just noticed some familiar links on first results page of the Google search for 'pwnage'.

In these next few weeks we plan to take appropriate steps to protect our intellectual property and continue to make our show with the same title that we have been using since April 2004.