Seven-year-old boy denied passport by UK Home office over Star Wars copyright infringement for Skywalker name

He says his son was eventually issued the passport and the family’s vacation is still on.

Sounds to me like someone so the passport office was just being an idiot and when their supervisor looked into it it was resolved.

Government employee makes mistake, other employee corrects mistake, innocent family suffers minor inconvenience. Stay tuned for more.
- Omg, i hope they are all ok. This must have been so traumatizing for all involved. I can't even
- Don't forget to be outraged!

Private corporations tying the hands of governments with copyright BS? If I want to name my daughter Khaleesi Skywalker Gandalf Bethooven SpaceJam that's none of the governments nor some random corporations business. You can't trademark a fucking name, wtf is this bullshit? You don't get to decide what my name is, and you definitely don't get to hamstring official government agencies in their duties because you're butthurt about my sharing a name with your fictional character. Go fuck yourselves, disney. You slimy litigious fucks, this is why your brand is sinking.

This isn't a rule. Some bureaucrat was mistaken.
The same thing happened to another girl a couple weeks ago.
- But it is indicitive of the Anglo-Saxon propensity for bootlicking. /Celtposting
Yeah, Disney is slimy, but for once this isn't their doing. Some paper pusher overstepped their boundaries, that's not on Disney.
There are rules around names for children with food reason, if you name your child Hitler and Unwanted you can expect government intervention because it can be perceived as child abuse by putting undue stress and difficulty on the child.
Which I believe is fair
This name doesnt quite hit that mark but I would defend government intervention when naming children for outlier cases.
- All fair and good, but that kid has been named without government interference, so the name is legally given. So they shouldn't be able to then deny an identification document later.

Loki Skywalker. Jesus, these parents need a smack

Naming children after the mythical figures of a culture is perfectly acceptable.
- True and fair, but what do you think when you hear that someone's name is Loki (who isn't from a Scandinavian country)?
- And Jedi is actually recognised as an official religion in the US. And there’s plenty of people who identify as Jedi in the UK as well. So one could certainly argue that it’s violating someone’s religious beliefs by not allowing that name. At least Luke Skywalker has some evidence of existing…
How many people in the world named Jesus or Mohammad?
- I'm an atheist and even I know that's a weird comparison. You can't copyright the name Jesus. Or Loki even cause they're deities. But Skywalker as a name is for sure made up by Lucas. Maybe in 500 years when star wars is a recognized religion, but the star wars people need to do some conquering and crimes against humanity to qualify for that

Well my kid Coca-Cola Disney Unilever Squid is fucked.

Come on, Flying.... You knew that the minute you named them Coca-Cola Disney Unilever.
I mean can you just imagine the teasing we would have heard on the playground with "cola"? Everyone knows colas are the lowest soft drink.
- That's why they go by Unilever.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior

Something as short as "Skywalker" can't be copyrighted. You don't need permission to use a trademark as long as you don't harm the brand or confuse the customer. Since trademarks are often family names, there are a number of unrelated companies that operate under the same name but in a different business.

Sure, but, also, that it's an existing brand is simply irrelevant to a personal name. You don't need to establish that it doesn't damage the brand, it can even directly damage the brand in fact, it still doesn't matter because people aren't products.

Isn't copyright just for commercial use? Is that different in Britain?

He says his son was eventually issued the passport and the family’s vacation is still on.
That’s not how copyright works anywhere. Read the Berne convention.

Man, that's a stupid name. Poor kid permanently tied to a pop culture reference. Two, if the Loki is referring to Marvel. Naming a kid is not an opportunity to express yourself. If you want people to know you like star wars, get a tattoo. Or a bumper sticker. And then I'll judge you. But leave the kid out of it.

How do you think Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Jacob etc feel named after made up Bible characters?
If you can find a time machine, the braydens, jaydens, aydens, aidens, alicias, felicias, aleeshas, leEverythings, and every intentionally-misspelled version of a normal name, will be spared a lifetime of "it's like this but spelled like that because my mom sniffed glue" discussions.
- That part really gets me. Why the fuck would you name your kid a name you can't fucking spell. And before paperwork is submitted there should be a law that steps in and stops the naming.
It's probably a reference to Marvel. In the Germanic tradition you a) don't name kids directly after gods, though gods may make up part of the name, say Thorgeir, Thor's spear, and b) not after Loki. Between fucking a horse (and getting pregnant) and tying a goat to his balls he really should be off limits.
- Between fucking a horse (and getting pregnant) and tying a goat to his balls he really should be off limits.
  So much for the tolerant left!!!

My son happens to have the name of one of my favorite comic book characters. However, it's only one of his names, and also it's a name that's real and normal so nobody would think twice about it. I wouldn't name him such an obvious name that is only tired to the one character
I have a somewhat unusual name, that could me male or female. I really didn't like it growing up. Now i don't care anymore, moat people call me a wrong name anyway that sounds similar. But damn, growing up i just wanted a normal ass name.
- growing up i just wanted a normal ass name.
  Now, as an adult, you can name your ass whatever you want!

TL;DR: he wasn't denied. He was permitted.

He was later permitted. The delay being one bureacrat somewhere was being a corporate bootlicker, possibly based on some bootlicking regulation but maybe just a blanket misinterpretation of a law.

He [the father] says his son was eventually issued the passport and the family’s vacation is still on.

Sounds like that office doesn't know how their own rules work.

I think this is the second time this has happened in recent months. I am wondering if the UK bureaucracy has some sort of training about not violating trademarks generally, or some sort of software filter to avoid trademarked terms. Regardless, it seems like a fairly petty annoyance that affects a tiny number of people and can be worked around.

Or hell, maybe it's the same clerk and Gareth from Slough is sticking to his guns.

Why would you do that to your child? I mean, you wanna change your own name, go for it.

People have been choosing made up names from fiction for hundreds (thousands?) of years and as far I know, no one has died from it yet. Jessica is just a character from a play.
- I get the sentiment but "Loki Skywalker" and "Jessica" are far from comparable even if Jessica would have been viewed in the same light 500 years ago.
You are making a lot of assumptions about this childs parents. Starting with they had a concept of a plan to begin with.
- concept of a plan
  Are we talking about the weekly updates on Trumps healthcare plan? Look: he'll get a plan and we'll like it. There's no need to keep nagging him every year.
Nowadays naming your kid is a way to make a statement about yourself. Like a vanity plate.
- yourself. Like a vanity plate.
  You had me at Vanity and Yourself. That really encapsulates the impression.
The only thing that's stupid about this IMO is that Skywalker is supposed to be a last name, not a first/given name.
- I'd say if you are appropriating a name from a fictional character for your child (which seems an odd choice, but which I think people should be able to do) it probably doesn't matter much whether you take further creative liberties with it in that way.
- Just like Tiffany and countless other surnames. Things change.
- Last names are often used as first names.
  It's his middle name. His first name is Loki.
- supposed to be a last name, not a first/given name.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mackenzie_Davis
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clark_Kent_(Superman_%26_Lois)
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naming_law_in_Sweden -- ultimately a godsend.
It's the middle name at least.
Should have named him Luke. It's a perfectly normal name, it'd fly under the radar. But youd still have named him after him.
- Seems like that should be flagged for copyright infringement as well.

Would that not be trademark infringement, if anything?

This is stupid

So if they name a movie character Jane Doe then are they going to stop Jane Doe from getting a passport

It is stupid, yes, but they wouldn’t be able to do that anyway.
I’m fairly certain that the article is using the wrong term here and the problem is that the name Skywalker is trademarked.
You wouldn’t be able to trademark the name Jane Doe so you wouldn’t be able to prevent someone from using it.
- A trademark does not prevent a person from using a term in a non-commercial setting, it does prevent other companies from doing so.

And Loki is a Nordic god, so nothing to worry about (except if those gods get angry, then good night). The name Skywalker might be the bigger issue here. But even then, no copyright infringement, except if they try to sell their son I guess.

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