Valve Filled the DotA Trademark

It seems things start to get serious here. After the recent tweets about DotA from the Duke Nukem voice actor, recently Valve has just filled the trademark application for 'DOTA'. This step is a must if IceFrog and Valve want to continue using DotA as their new game title and don't wanna have trouble with the copyright or legal issues. And looking on how DotA word is already spread and really popular (it might be more popular than Warcraft III itself), this move will put them in advantage compared to the other DotA-like games (League of Legends, Heroes of Newerth, ect).


If you wanna see the details about the trademark application, check it out on USPTO:

Mark 'DOTA'
Standard Character claim: Yes
Current Status: Newly filed application, not yet assigned to an examining attorney.
Date of Status: 2010-08-10
Filing Date: 2010-08-06

LAST APPLICANT(S)/OWNER(S) OF RECORD

Valve Corporation

Address
Valve Corporation
10500 NE 8th St Ste 1000
Bellevue, WA 980044359
United States
Legal Entity Type: Corporation
State or Country of Incorporation: Washington
Phone Number: 509.241.1502
Fax Number: 509.232.2112

Date applied: August 10 2010

International Class: 009
Class Status: Active
Computer game software; Electronic game software; Video game software

Honestly, this is a really smart move. Even though the current DotA is a Warcraft III custom map, the word 'DOTA' itself is not yet a trademark (please correct me if i'm wrong) and has a very high commercial value. I think it won't be hard for Valve (with IceFrog support) to get the approval for this application. Well, let's see what'll happen on the next day. Stay tune on DotA-Blog for more news!

PS: Maybe this is the reason why IceFrog change the latest map name from DotA-Allstars, into only DotA.