Dreamwerks Production, Inc. v. SKG Studio
United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
142 F.3d 1127 (1998)
Dreamwerks Production (plaintiff), a small company running Star Trek-themed science fiction conventions since 1984, trademarked its name in 1992. DreamWorks SKG Studio (defendant), a major Hollywood film studio founded in 1994, later adopted a similar name. Dreamwerks sued for trademark infringement, arguing its own reputation would suffer if convention-goers thought they were attending a DreamWorks-branded event instead. The district court granted DreamWorks summary judgment, apparently reasoning that Dreamwerks's relative obscurity compared to the famous studio defeated any real confusion claim.
Whether the standard for trademark infringement changes when the company holding the more famous, later-created (junior) mark is much better known than the company holding the earlier (senior) mark.