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Punk Walks Out of WWE


Strummer

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That's from the ECW assets, not signing the Dudley's.

Fair enough, didn't know that. How come RVD, Rhyno and others got to keep their names?

They had the names before ECW.

 

And Punk only signed his name over the same way people who use their real names do, temp assignments for merch. At least AFAIK.

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That's from the ECW assets, not signing the Dudley's.

Fair enough, didn't know that. How come RVD, Rhyno and others got to keep their names?

They had the names before ECW.

 

And Punk only signed his name over the same way people who use their real names do, temp assignments for merch. At least AFAIK.

 

 

The WWE has the trademarks:

 

http://trademarks.justia.com/771/42/cm-punk-77142597.html

http://trademarks.justia.com/853/53/cm-punk-85353466.html

http://trademarks.justia.com/860/32/cm-86032111.html

 

The last one is pending, though likely to become a registration soon.

 

The first one reference's Phil's consent.

 

Going to the USPTO and looking at the documents submitted for it... well, it's kind of funny and convoluted on the WWE's part. Anyway, what they cite as "consent" are six heavily redacted pages out of Punk's 2008 book contract. I haven't compared with with the other easily available booking contracts (Vince's, Trip's, Steph's), but the language looks pretty WWE-standard on IP rather than anything unique for Punk.

 

One suspects Punk can get the trademarks transferred to his own name, but he also likely would need to sign a license with the WWE covering their use of those marks in various ways (i.e. all his matches in the library, the inclusion of Punk in games, toys, etc). Use of Punk's performances that are in the library are already covered by his contract elsewhere, and likely well covered after the Ventura lawsuit. But the WWE likely would want a nice clean license to cover transferring them back. In turn, Punk probably would want to try to exclude some things from that license (say being added to future Games or future Toys with Phil's specific consent and perhaps an increase in $$$).

 

Anyway, I suspect this is the manner with most SuperStars. We'll have a better insight into Phil's future when these are transferred to him.

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So if he shows up to TNA, he will or won't have to be called MC Phil?

 

 

He would be CM Punk, and the WWE won't chase him over it. But if he wants to continue to do business as CM Punk outside of the WWE, he'll likely ask (and get) the trademarks assigned back to him.

 

There are some funny ones out there. Both Jericho (Chris Irvine) and the WWE have a "Chris Jericho" trademark in Class 41 for pretty much the same thing. Irvine's would have priority: it's older, and cites first use going back 9 years earlier. Jericho actually filed his application right before coming to the WWF, so he's pretty smart about this. It is odd that Chris let them register it rather than simply license usage to them.

 

It's likely there are a lot of goofy ones out there like that.

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And now for an insane development, there is a Twitter handle called @PhilBrooksMMA with a YouTube video channel called SociopathicPunk that is either "Phil" getting himself set up for his post-WWE life, or someone punking (no pun intended) Internet marks.

 

The voice in the video he posted certainly sounds like him.

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Until this is confirmed, I choose not to believe Punk is someone that would post pictures of food he's about to eat.

 

Or even Tweet when he doesn't have to. Wasn't he dragged kicking and screaming to Twitter in the first place?

 

Definitely a long form LiveJournal type of guy than the soundbite nature of other social network platforms like Facebook, MySpace, Tumblr, Reddit, Twitter and even YouTube.

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