[00:00:01] Speaker A: Want to protect your business. The time is near. You've given it heart. Now get it in gear. It's passage to profit with Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart.
[00:00:12] Speaker B: I'm Richard Gerhardt, founder of Gearhart Law, a full service intellectual property law firm specializing in patents, trademarks, and copyrights.
[00:00:20] Speaker C: And I'm Elizabeth Gearhart. Not an attorney, but I work at Gearhart Law doing the marketing, and I have my own startups.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: Welcome to passage to profit, everyone. The road to entrepreneurship, where we talk with startups, small businesses, and discuss the intellectual property that helps them flourish. It's time for IP in the news, and I guess we're going to be talking about one of my favorite actors, Dwayne the Rock Johnson, one of the most famous actors everywhere. And he's got a new gig now.
[00:00:48] Speaker D: With the TKO group, which is the.
[00:00:50] Speaker B: Group that owns WWE and the UFC. So these are both professional wrestling associations, as I'm sure you all know. And he was able to secure, as part of his deal with them, ownership of the word the rock as a trademark.
[00:01:07] Speaker C: And that is unusual because they own the characters and the marketing for the wrestlers in WWE. And the wrestlers don't get to own their own trademarks, typically. We had a wrestler on here a few years ago, and he explained the whole thing to us. So for a wrestler to be able to own his own trademark name, that's huge. But he's on the board now, so that was why they let him do it.
[00:01:29] Speaker B: And I think that's probably it. In order to own a piece of intellectual property that's owned by the WWE, you have to be like Dwayne the Rock Johnson to get there. You have to be that important. That's how tightly they control their intellectual property. Anyway, now it's time for Richard's roundtable, and I'm going to ask Kenya, what do you think about all of this?
[00:01:53] Speaker E: Well, I think it's because he's the rock, right? Unless then he's on the board of directors. He's very profitable. He's made the organization a lot of money. He's a strong brand by himself. So it's like, that holds a lot of juice when you're the Rock.
[00:02:06] Speaker B: I think it's a pretty cool thing. Kudos to him. And I know that part of the rock came from an association that he had with his father. And so I think it has a special sentimental attachment for him. Nick Pigeon, what do you think?
[00:02:19] Speaker F: I think it's amazing. I mean, being able to own your own name and being able to protect your brand and it's obviously been a fight for him for a long time, so fair play to him.
[00:02:29] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, they didn't just turn it over to him. Right. I mean, he's been a famous moneymaker for a long time, but I guess now's the right.
[00:02:37] Speaker F: Absolutely.
[00:02:38] Speaker B: Absolutely. So, Kimberly, what are your thoughts about this?
[00:02:41] Speaker G: So I think we need to really think about the WWE and how there's just so much talent in that organization and there's been so much talent throughout the years. So obviously this has been something that all of the talent has had to deal with, but none of them are quite as big as Dwayne Johnson. We know him by the Rock and Dwayne Johnson. Right. So at this point, him getting the trademark after all these years probably is a really big victory for him. But imagine what that would have done for him ten years ago when he got out of the WWE. So I think that it's a great thing for him. It's a great victory, but he's overcome not having that trademark by leaps and bounds. But we have to think about all of the talent, that maybe that's the only way that we know them is by their stage name, and maybe they should be fighting for a little bit more ownership of that trademark as they're trying to go in different endeavors outside from the WWE.
[00:03:33] Speaker B: I think it affects his ability to market himself. For example, in film, he had the nickname the Rock, but I don't think they could use it in the credits. They always had to say Dwayne Johnson, and so now he can use that to capitalize on his other content. I mean, he's already famous and maybe more symbolic than anything else, but it'll certainly help him. Herman, what do you think?
[00:03:55] Speaker H: To be honest, I'm shocked. I can't believe they actually gave it up. I would be very curious to find out what is actually valued at the Rock. What is that worth to WWE to actually give it up? Or what was that worth to Dwayne? Because I'm pretty sure he's not getting any monetary gains, like a payment every month for being on board. But I wonder what that was worth to him to actually get his name. But congratulations and kudos to him and something Damaris and I always stress ownership of IP intellectual property, and even your name is just crucial in all businesses that you have.
[00:04:25] Speaker B: That's a really great point. I wonder if WWE got a big tax write off for.
Maybe that was part of the motivation. Damaris, what is your opinion?
[00:04:36] Speaker I: Sure, I think it's a great thing to happen. I think this might open a door for new WWE people to be able to have the opportunity to own that. So overall, I think it's great, and I'm happy to see what happens with the rest of the talent that comes up.
[00:04:48] Speaker B: No, that's a really great point. I think that a lot of wrestlers have mixed feelings about the ownership of the WWE and their characters because they put a lot of time and effort into developing their personas and to not be able to do it once they leave the organization and capitalize on any of the effort that they put in. On the one hand, they get the benefits of the WWE. On the other hand, once you're gone, there's not much you can do with it. So that's a really great point.
[00:05:20] Speaker C: Yeah. So Richard, if our listeners want to learn more about trademarks, where can they go?
[00:05:25] Speaker B: I'm glad you asked. You can go to learnmoutrademarks.com. And if you're interested in patents which are kind of related to trademarks, you can go to learnmoreaboutpatents.com. There you can book a consultation with me, Richard Gerhardt, or you can download some free content that will help you understand trademarks and patents even better. So thank you for that and make sure you go to learn more about trademarks.com and learn more about patents.com. Before we go, I'd like to thank the passage to profit team, Noah Fleischmann, our producer Alicia Morrissey, our program director. Our podcast can be found tomorrow anywhere you find your podcast. Just look for the passage to profit.
[00:06:04] Speaker D: Show and you can find us on Instagram and threads at passage to profit show and Twitter. Or if you're even more up to date, x at passage to profit and on our YouTube channel. Please also join us on our new Facebook group, search for passage to profit show Listener community a new community space for our listeners and guests where you can post questions that you would like answered on the show and interact with the passage to profit team.
[00:06:30] Speaker B: And remember, while the information on this program is believed to be correct, never take a legal step without checking with your legal professional first. Gearhart Law is here for your patent, trademark and copyright needs. You can find
[email protected] and contact us for a free consultation. Take care everybody. Thanks for listening and we'll be back next week.
