Disney files trademark for "Seal Team 6;" possibly for "Killing bin Laden" snow globes, Christmas ornaments

SEAL Team 6 is the elite Navy squad credited with killing Osama bin Laden. One day after the raid, Disney Enterprises, Inc., filed applications with the US. Patent and Trademark Office to trademark the name "SEAL TEAM 6." The trademark has not yet been granted.

A quick USPTO web search shows three applications (screengrabs below). The applications cover a variety of uses. The first, for "Entertainment and education services." A second application covers "Toys, games and playthings; gymnastic and sporting articles (except clothing); hand-held units for playing electronic games other than those adapted for use with an external display screen or monitor; Christmas stockings; Christmas tree ornaments and decorations; snow globes." And a third covers "Clothing, footwear and headwear."

The USPTO database also shows that a company based in Calabasas called NovaLogic applied in 2002 and 2004 for a "Seal Team 6" mark for electronic games, and was denied.

More in the Orlando Sentinel. Mediabistro also had an item up on this a few days ago. Here's an Associated Press item.

* Snow globes you say? The things we can't take beyond TSA checkpoints? Oh, sweet irony.

(via the BB submitterator, thanks miho)

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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oedrex1

I don’t believe you can trademark Government entities.
- Boba Fett Diop
  
  Technically, the government officially denies the existence of SEAL Team 6, as with Delta and other Tier One JSOC assets.
Recluse

In my fantasies, Disney execs are woken up in the middle of the night by scary guys in black balaclavas with MP5′s who gently advise them that trademarking the name of an elite counter-terrorist unit isn’t a good idea.

But I also have fantasies about responsible government which aren’t coming true either…certainly not any sooner than the ones with the 20 year old twins and the whipped cream…
RedShirt77

Isn’t “Seal Team 6″ the intellectual property of the US navy?

And if these guys get declassified and want to write a book, how much do they have to pay Disney for the rights to their own heroism?
Anonymous

Look daddy, I’m killing people in cold blood too!
Baldhead

“Seal Team 6″ is a nickname, not the official name of the unit, which is as secret as the names of any of the individuals who make up the unit. As for intellectual property… trademark and IP aren’t exactly the same. You can come up with something but not trademark it and wind up losing out on millions (look up the trademark story for the smiley face)
Anonymous

Umm… Wouldn’t the Seal Team 6 name already be the property of Seal Team 6? Why doesn’t Disney copyright the name Supreme Court or IRS?
AirPillo

Oh fuck Disney so much.

They’re capable of actually thinking for themselves, why does so much of their empire revolve around parking their ass on something they don’t own and claiming it’s theirs?
semiotix

I don’t know about seals–Disney doesn’t have any noteworthy seal characters that I’m aware of. But you have to admit, suitably fictionalized for children, it would make a pretty great DuckTales episode.

It’d go like this. Flintheart Glomgold (a bearded evildoer) has stolen Scrooge’s lucky dime and is holed up in his castle keep. A daring rescue mission ensues, but trouble strikes when Launchpad McQuack, in classic bumbling-sidekick fashion, crashes the helicopter! Etc. etc. Bob Iger, if you’re reading this and want me to flesh it out to a full script treatment, you have my number.
Anonymous

I couldn’t work out what the embroidered badge was supposed to be of so I compared it to the metal cap badge.Didn’t anyone check the design before they had it made up? They left the eagle’s head off.
Rob Cruickshank

Disney knew what they were doing when they bought Marvel. They needed Silly Seal for a mission. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ziggy_Pig_and_Silly_Seal
Anonymous

Disney is a trademark and copyright powerhouse. They licensed the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and enforce trademark infringements on behalf of the Canadian (er, Harper) Goverment (actually this was enacted years before the Harper Gov’t took power.)

http://www.mountieshop.com/new/about_the_foundation.asp

Of course it’s all good in the end, and all that licensing moolah goes to charitable organizations.
bonnie snarko

This is probably pretty close to what Disney plans to do with it:

http://www.disneydispatch.com/content/tidings/2011/disney-presents-seal-pals-6

It’s also hysterically funny…
Anonymous

The name should be in the public domain – Disney has no more claim to it than anyone else.
Anonymous

I have to say that this is in poor taste. Is there nothing this Corporate monster will try and control?.
EscapingTheTrunk

As someone who’s watched the “Spirited Away” commentary far too many times, let me tell you: sometimes WED employees don’t know that there are multiple meanings for the word “seal.”
Mister44

Fun fact:

During WWII Disney made logos and mascots for various military entities. These ranged from patch and nose cone art, to silk screened prints for ships, battalions, etc.

My grandpa was on the USS Altman, which was a transport ship from Europe to the Pacific. He had a print with Donald the sailor, rowing Pluto dressed as a GI in boat with a sign to Tokyo floating in the water. The ship number was on the rowboat. Really neat stuff.

Underwater Demolition Team was the precursor to the SEALs, and while I don’t know exactly where their patch designs come from, it is possible Disney originally did some of them.
Rotwang

Can we expect an Assassination Island ride?
yosemite

So when can we expect the new Disney movie “Seal Team 6: Osama Bin Bye-Bye!”, where a 6-pack of fun-loving animated seals travel to Pakistan to track down the wacky terrorist. When things get hairy, the newly betrothed prince and princess of Wales swoop in to help Seal Team 6 save the day!

Hi-jinks! Burkas! Porn? Uh, maybe not.
phisrow

I, for one, am wishing for mind-bleach after imagining the horror that would be a slapstick cartoon comedy piece starring Goofy as the heroic SEAL K9.(Perhaps they could get the cast of middle-eastern stereotypes who have been unemployed since Aladdin to play the unthreatening comic villains…)
- millrick
  
  Goofy?
  dude, Pluto was born to play that role!
taj1f

I’m seeing cgi harbor seals, going after the terrorists who clubbed the widdle baby seals at the Central Park Zoo! And then, after the terrorists are beat, they’ll expand their operations and go after the Russians!

What Would Walt Do? What would Marlon Perkins do?

Cash in!
Anonymous

I remember how popular the Waffen SS amusement park in Berlin was way back when.
Anonymous

Prior Art:

Richard Marchinko. Doesn’t that invalidate the trademark?

RGB
Anonymous

When this story popped up, I was thinking of this:

“MOOOOOM! The brothers are going to an Arabian country on a motorized hanglider THEY built!”
redesigned

Disney, you suck. full stop.
randomguy

Freedom isn’t free, it costs folks like you and me. And if we don’t all chip in we’ll never pay that bill. Freedom isn’t free, there’s a hefty fuckin’ fee (for trademark infringement). And if you don’t throw in your buck o’ five, who will?
Samurai Gratz

taj is right. This is totally a grab for the name so they can do a silly slapstick team of trained seals (animals) going on missions for Amurica, I guarantee it. Like those stupid movies where talking RL dogs go into space. LAME.
Maggie Koerth-Baker

I’m glad I’m not the only one who immediately assumed that Disney’s Seal Team 6 was going to be made up of harbor seals.

$5 says one of them will be wearing aviator glasses and chomping on a cigar.
poolaka

9/11 – Never Forget…Our profit margins!
Wickedashtray

NOVALOGIC…..lol.

The game was supposed to be out 6 years ago. no one knows if they’re even in business anymore. They had huge success with several games and squandered every cent they made.