So, I'll start by responding to a post from the prior thread:

One point of correction: "Toys for Bob" isn't involved in this.  Paul and Fred are working as individuals outside their company, presumably because if they didn't, Activision would own the game.

I'll also note that P&F removed any mention of making a "sequel to Star Control" from their blog; it now only refers to Star Control in a historical sense.  So while their initial post may have stepped over the line, and they may owe some damages for that mistake, their intent is to avoid doing anything that would require paying Stardock royalties.  Their position is that they wrote the story for the prior games, and their contract let them retain the copyright, so they should be able to continue that story under a new title without needing anyone's permission.

However, Stardock is claiming that its trademark rights don't just cover the game's title, but also cover most of the names used within the earlier games, such that doing anything in the same game universe requires its permission.  This is a broader interpretation of trademark rights than anyone had previously asserted over the game.  I'm not saying that it's wrong (that's up to the courts), but it has taken a lot of people by surprise.

Just posting because I can't work out how else to subscribe to the thread.

(Another reply from the prior thread):

There is a significant difference with UQM:  Most fan projects are leveraging the publisher's game's engine, content, or both, and therefore require the use of the original game's copyright, in addition to its trademark.  In UQM's case, the engine and content are open-source/Creative Commons.  Moreover, it's not using any registered trademark of the original game, and any common law trademarks that might apply have never been tested in court.  So the question of whether Stardock has any basis at all for asserting control over UQM is still an open one.

This seems like the last thing UQM would want to do, and I doubt it's legally possible:  The GPL and CC-SA license terms forbid mingling UQM with any code that isn't under those same licenses.  And even if it was possible, becoming a mod of SC:O would not "protect" UQM; rather, it would cement Stardock's control of the project.  Speaking for myself, one of the best things about the UQM project has always been the fact that it was independent of outside control, and I would like to see it continue that way.

The "significant difference" matters a lot less than you are making it out to. If Stardock wanted to assert its trademark, it doesn't matter if UQM has a copyright on every bit of art or code in the project itself. Any legal case would be judged on the merits of the trademark and its usage, the copyright, an entirely separate legal point, plays no part in that judgment.

For that matter, UQM's situation vis a vis Stardock has absolutely no relation to Stardock's current lawsuit against P&F. It has no involvement in the conflict, and its activities don't touch upon Stardock's trademark in a manner that Stardock finds to be infringing. This is something Brad himself has stated. It is ultimately up to you whether you want to believe Brad or not, but there is a limit as to how far Stardock or Brad should feel a need to go or expend time and resources on.

With respect to your claim that the trademark covers the story proper taking people by surprise, there are also those of us who aren't surprised by the claim. What would have surprised us was if the trademark didn't cover the story.

You took a far too narrow reading for Brad's statement, and are ignoring the clarifications he made after it. What Brad has made very, very clear is that Stardock does not consider UQM's usage of the names and etc to be engaging in commerce. Since trademarks deal with usage in commerce specifically, UQM's activities have no relevance to the trademark dispute between Stardock and P&F. If you are trying to construct a narrative wherein you want UQM's activities to have relevance to the lawsuit, the only way that narrative would work would be if UQM was engaged in some sort of in-commerce activity using the Star Control trademark. If UQM was doing this, Stardock, as the trademark owner, would be legally obliged to take action against UQM. On the other hand, Brad has stated very clearly that he does not consider UQM's activities to touch upon Stardock's trademark. That by definition precludes it from being relevant to their current lawsuit.

UQM never possessed the sort of independence you seem to think it had. Trademark law, except in very narrow instances of fair use and parody, assumes priority of the trademark owner. If UQM strayed outside of those bounds or engaged in commerce with the Star Control trademark, the trademark owner would have legal mechanisms to shut it down. If the trademark owner even though that UQM's existence could interfere with the owner's commerce usage of the trademark, UQM has no standing to continue. Benign neglect is literally one of the best ways for companies to treat such fan projects. It's also the primary method of survival for most of these projects. They keep their heads down, take care that they don't do anything that would require the official trademark owners to formally take notice of them, and they are allowed to continue doing things they enjoy. It is effectively an informal legal truce between the trademark owners and the fan community, one that both sides usually have reason to want to maintain, but one in which one side, the trademark owner, holds most of the cards. You may not like it, you may not agree with it, but it's the accommodation that the industry as a whole has arrived at without having to expend lots of time, effort, and money trying to dot all the i's and cross all the t's.

Ok i got to say it. After Brad has very clearly said he wasnt going to sue Ur Quan Masters. P and F is trying very hard to make Stardock to sue them. 

I'm not sure Brad's interpretation of trademark is limited in the way you describe; he seemed to be suggesting that he could do more than just force it to rename.

Which copyright claim is this?  As far as I'm aware, Stardock has an uncontested copyright claim on the original parts of Star Control 3, and may be contesting a claim to the derived portions.  But UQM is derived from Star Control 2, and while Stardock is disputing Paul&Fred's copyright to SC2, I haven't (yet) seen them advance a claim that they have it.

I believe the idea is that if Stardock felt that UQM or some derivative of it did something that counted as "commercial" (in their judgement), they would shut it down. 

The difficulty is that there are three different definitions of "commercial" in play:  One defined by the CC-NC license, one defined by Stardock, and one defined by trademark law.  The project is used to operating under the first, Stardock wants to impose the second, and the law cares about the third.

Stardock is using the definition by trademark law. The one defined by CC-NC is irrelevant in the context of trademark law and offers little to no actual protection in the context of a trademark dispute. It is entirely possible to release a work under CC-NC terms and still be engaged in commerce. The CC-NC license is more intended as a shield against someone else misusing the released work and biting the people that released it initially than as a shield for use by the people that did the original releasing.

Not going to happen Stardock doesnt want that. If someone picked up the trademark to sell these games. Then the trademark would cost more than what they would get for the games. Im sorry no one wants your games, but you. In the future they would even get less. 

So, as mentioned in reply #15, there hasn't been any suggestion so far that Stardock has any copyright on Star Control 2, or on the UQM project that came from it.  All of Stardock's claims that might give it any control over UQM are based on trademark.

Stardock does make a claim that some of the contractors who worked on SC2 might have copyright claims on it, but none of them have stepped forward to make any.  And Stardock does claim to own the copyright to SC3, but SC3 is mostly irrelevant to UQM.

Also, to the best of my non-lawyer knowledge, only trademarks impose an"obligation to act"; copyrights do not.

There was no agreement between UQM and Accolade because by 2001, when the project was founded, the understanding was that Accolade's license to the Star Control 2 copyright had expired, such that Paul and Fred had regained all of the copyright rights, and that the only other IP limitation on the game was the "Star Control" trademark, which the project dealt with by removing every instance of the words "Star Control".

And the agreement between UQM and Paul&Fred (or T4B, if they'd formed it by then) consisted only of the two licenses (GPL 2.0 and Creative Commons BY-NA-SA) that they released the code and content under.

Certainly.  If Stardock had the copyright on SC2, it would be an entirely different situation, because copyright gives control over copying even when that copying isn't "use in commerce".  The "use in commerce" question only matters for trademarks.

I have noticed that Ur Quan masters HD start with the beginnig of 2. It would be better to give the whole story. Now that it looks litke you will; also have 3 you should put all three stories into a HD game. Right now you could only put 1 and 2 together. That would make it better.