Surnames: Can You Make Your Mark Legally?

Abstract

What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. -William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

Shakespeare believed that name does not matter, what matters is what a person is. He also was convinced that people will still smell a rose and appreciate its beauty, even if it was called it by some other name.

But these lines, I am afraid, do not hold true in today’s globalised environment where the quality and the worth of the product is gauged by the name of the manufacturer they are coming from.

This paper examines the scope of protection being offered to the family names as trademarks, against the freedom of using one’s own family name as a trademark. This paper also analyses the rights and protection that should be afforded to the people who are late entrants into a specific business.

Keywords: Trademark, Family Name, Registration of Trademark, Intellectual Property