SkidAce said:
How about nobody owns it and they can all use it?
What are you a communist socialist secret muslim thief terrorist pirate scofflaw who hates creativity and wants to make the shareholders of Zenimax poor because their innovative creativity of calling something a "dragonborn" cannot be capitalized on in a free market without regulation and I am Taxed Enough Already and the government should get its hands off of my Medicare!
Wait...what?
Anyway, trademark =/= copyright. The big difference, from
my idiot's understanding, is that a "trademark" just tells you that the particular product in question came from a particular producer -- it specifically identifies the source of a particular good.
So if someone used "dragonborn" in the title of a game after registering this, Zenimax might get huffy and claim that their trademark was violated: "Dragonborn is our trademark!" they huff. "Dragonborn = Zenimax!"
So if WotC published a computer game called "Rise of the Dragonborn," that might be problematic. It might not be, though: if the two are unlikely to be confused, Hasbro would probably have some sort of case (not that they'd pursue it). The fact that an Elder Scrolls dragonborn and a D&D dragonborn are pretty distinct would probably be a point in Hasbro's favor (even though the dragonborn I played in Skyrim was a reptile with mammaries...yay Argonian!): someone is unlikely to confuse a D&D dragonborn with a Zenimax dragonborn....though Zenimax might have a case, there.
If WotC published a computer game that just included the D&D dragonborn as a playable race, the only problems might be from an overly litigious Zenimax (which is a risk: Zenimax IS overly litigious!), but it's unlikely that they'd waste much time on it.
It's also possible that they'd be turned down due to the word "dragonborn" not being
distinctive enough. Given how...pliable...the agencies that regulate these things are, I don't personally hold out much hope for that. Much more likely to be decided later in court when an overzealous Zenimax sues someone who isn't going to just settle and a fair court is all like "Hey! This word is waaaaaaay to general to specifically identify a Zenimax thing."