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Pasadena Beats Trademark Lawsuit Over Rose Bowl
Law360 (July 13, 2021, 7:59 PM EDT) A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed a trademark lawsuit filed by college football s Rose Bowl against the game s California host city of Pasadena, ruling that a single Instagram reference to the game was a so-called nominative fair use.
The decision came in a case filed by the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association, a nonprofit that produces the game, against the city, which owns the eponymous stadium, over the association s decision to hold the 2021 event in Texas amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
In filing the lawsuit, the Tournament of Roses Association wanted a ruling that the agreements between the city and the.
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A California federal judge asked Pasadena and the organization behind the Rose Bowl Game during a hearing Friday why they are in court fighting over who has control of the famous annual college football game, asking if the century-old partners could resolve the issue on their own.
The Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. (By Ted Eytan, CC BY-SA 2.0)
LOS ANGELES (CN) A trademark dispute over which city gets to host the annual college Rose Bowl football game has set the city of Pasadena against the nonprofit organization that oversees the New Year’s Day tournament.
Last February, the tournament organizers sued the city of Pasadena, California in federal court over a dispute on ownership of the Rose Bowl trade name.
On Friday, attorneys for the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Association and the city argued over the “force majeure” clause or extraordinary circumstances described as an act of God that moved the game out of the Golden State earlier this year.
Tensions between the parties escalated when restrictions arising from the COVID-19 pandemic caused the cancellation of the annual Rose Parade and barred fans from attending the Rose Bowl Game in Pasadena. The game was ultimately moved to Arlington, Texas, marking the first time since 1942 the Rose Bowl game was played outside of Pasadena.
The Los Angeles federal court lawsuit states that the tournament association invoked the force majeure clause of its contract, maintaining that the pandemic was out of its control, so the association had the right to move the game out of Pasadena to AT&T Stadium in Arlington.