Rights And Interests Of Name Commercialization And Its Legal Protection

With the increasingly developed commodity economy in China,the name of natural person is no longer just a symbol to distinguish between specific individuals,especially the name with a certain popularity often highlights great property interests in the process of commercial use.In practice,trademark registration,brand name and advertising application can be seen everywhere,accompanied by frequent social phenomena such as rushing to register trademarks with celebrity names or commercializing celebrity names without permission,which has seriously infringed on the interests of the owners of the commercialization of names.China’s judicial practice has recognized the property interests contained in the name right of natural persons,but due to the unclear provisions on the commercialized rights and interests of names in the existing laws,it has failed to perfectly solve the problem of cross conflict between legal rights or rights and interests caused by the commercialized rights and interests of names.At present,there are different theories about the nature of the rights and interests of name commercialization in China’s legal circles,and its legal protection still needs to be improved.Looking at the legal protection mode of commercialized rights and interests in Britain,America,Germany and Japan,China has also explored a dichotomy mode suitable for China’s national conditions: the civil code is mainly used to protect the right of name.In addition to being regulated by the civil code,the commercialized rights and interests of name are also protected by the trademark law,the anti unfair competition law and other legal protection modes.On the basis of existing laws,China should improve the identification and relief of infringement and breach of contract of the rights and interests of name commercialization in the civil code;Improve and refine the content of "prior rights" in the trademark law,and effectively regulate the application of "adverse effects" clause.In addition,the anti unfair competition law,as a comprehensive protection law for the rights and interests,should expand the scope of subject protection so that it is no longer limited to operators,and should also refine the applicable conditions of name counterfeiting and confusion,so as to escort the legal protection of the rights and interests of name commercialization.