Tolkien-themed cryptocurrency shut down over copyright infringement
As I reported here back in August 2021, someone had tried to create a Lord Of The Rings-inspired cryptocurrency. The JRR Token, as it was so cleverly called, aspired to be the "The One Token That Rules Them All." Instead of giving 3 crypto-coins for the Elven-kings under the sky, 7 for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone, and 9 for mortal men doomed to die, the JRR Token announced plans to distribute 3% of its profits directly back to coin holders plus another 3% to a liquidity pool that "increases the stability of the token for everyone's benefit," plus another 3% for a designated marketing and charity investment fund.
Alas, the JRR Token was not meant to be. As LiveMint reports:
[The JRR Token website] was deemed "confusingly similar" to the trademark owned by the Tolkien estate and infringed its trademarks, a panel from the Geneva-based World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) ruled recently, and ordered the jrrtoken domain name to be transferred to Tolkien's estate. "There is no doubt that the respondent was aware of Tolkien's works and created a website to trade off the fame of these works," the panel said in its decision.
As such, the JRR Token has ceased all operations under the disputed name.
At press time, Tom Bombadil was not available for comment.
One token to rule them all? No, says Tolkien estate [LiveMint / Bloomberg]
New crypto currency JRR Token wants to be the "one coin to rule them all" [Thom Dunn / BoingBoing]
Image: Public Domain via PixaBay
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Thom Dunn, Khareem Sudlow
