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Nasir and Matt get into the story about a woman being accused of trademark infringement after changing her middle name to "Skywalker." They also answer the question, "What is the agent for service of process and who can I use for my business?" Full Podcast Transcript NASIR: Welcome to Legally Sound Smart Business. This is Nasir Pasha. MATT: And this is Matt Staub. NASIR: Coming from a far, far away galaxy and this is our podcast where we cover business legal news and answer some of your business legal questions that you, the listener, can send in to ask@legallysoundsmartbusiness.com. MATT: You’re really amped up for this episode. Remember you mentioned on a previous episode – I can’t remember which one you were – if you were Star Wars or Star Trek. NASIR: Star Wars, for sure. MATT: Star Wars, for sure? NASIR: Well, honestly, I just never watched Star Trek so I can’t even really judge but yeah. MATT: Yeah. Well, you’re going to like the story that we have today and maybe you’re going to do this, too. NASIR: Great! I’m excited! MATT: It’s going to be some advice for you because I know you’ve mentioned before wanting to change your middle name. NASIR: That’s true. MATT: This is going to be your legal advice on how to do it correctly. So, this is a weird story but there’s this woman in Europe, in the UK, and she legally changed her name, her middle name, to Skywalker. You know, whatever, you can change your name, not that big a deal, you would think. She’d changed a bunch of official documents, no problems. I’m sure other people have the name “Skywalker” maybe as a middle name because people that really love Star Wars, they can see that happening. Anyways, on her passport, apparently, there was an issue because they said the name Skywalker actually infringes on a trademark that I would assume that George Lucas or whatever company runs the… NASIR: George Lucas, he did sell some of the rights to create the movies to Disney which they’re creating the other ones, but I still think he retains most of the rights, if I recall, but I could be wrong. MATT: So, basically, they were saying, “Hey, this infringes on a trademark, you can’t use this and this isn’t going to work.” So, long story short, she’s going to be able to get around it so far with some weird process of she’d have to submit a new form with her old signature, blah blah blah. But this can’t be the first time that someone has changed their middle name to this – or I can definitely see two parents that are obsessed with Star Wars making “Skywalker” a kid’s middle name, right? I don’t think this is the first occurrence. NASIR: Exactly, and I find it very strange and I think it’s because she changed her name to that. Also, this is in the UK so it’s hard to really know what’s going on here, but it does show you the power of trademarks and copyright. You know, once you have it and you establish it and you enforce it, you have the home office in the UK of passports enforcing a law that they don’t even need to enforce necessarily. It doesn’t make any sense but it shows you that power. MATT: Yeah, you’re exactly right. I mean, you wouldn’t even think this would be an issue, and I’m sure she obviously didn’t because she might have thought twice about it. But there is a lot of power. It’s like they say; it’s not about getting the trademark or whatever piece of intellectual property. It’s all about the defense. I mean, that’s where the power comes. The story doesn’t even say whether George Lucas or Disney even cared. NASIR: No, I don’t think so. MATT: I don’t see why they would care. If anything, she’s just appreciating their work. They stopped it before it could even get to that point. It’s just so weird. Like, Skywalker, I’m sure there’s people with other middle names that are trademarked as well. I don’t see what the problem is. NASIR: And I can’t point to any specific case specifically but I’d be very surprised if some court found trademark infringement for som...