Activision Publishing, Inc. filed a trademark application on April 18, 2012, for “The Blast Furnace” with the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
The goods and services in the trademark filing (Serial Number: 85601232) cover “computer game software” and “Entertainment services, namely, providing an on-line computer game”.
In addition to the trademark filing, it appears Activision has privately acquired the related domain name, theblastfurnace.com (Whois), through the internet brand protection company MarkMonitor. Activision is a client of MarkMonitor.
In March 2012, the domain name <theblastfurnace.com> was registered to domain investor Frank Schilling’s Name Administration Inc. In April, the name transferred to DNStination, Inc., the Whois privacy service provided by MarkMonitor.
I’ve reached out to Frank Schilling via e-mail to see if any details about the transaction can be shared and I will update this story if I hear back.
At the time of this writing, Activision has made no announcement regarding “The Blast Furnace”.
[Update 1 at 8:30pm EST:. After a little digging on DomainNameSales, the online marketplace that features premium domain names from Frank Schilling’s private collection and other investors, it appears the domain name sold for anywhere between $10,000 and $20,000 USD. The sale was reported on April 19, 2012.]
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