This.

“In a statement to The Banner, the Ravens said that "the intent of this trademark filing is not to prevent anyone from the general use of 'Charm City.' We understand that 'Charm City' is a commonly utilized moniker by many entities, and we fully respect that."

"Our trademark filing is specific to anything in connection with, or relating to, Baltimore Ravens professional football. This includes team marketing campaigns — such as 'Charm City Football,' which is used to represent the history of football in Baltimore — slogans, merchandise and promotional items," the team added.”

The team is only attempting to protect Charm City when it’s used in connection to Baltimore Ravens Football. This is a preventative measure because allegedly some person in the past trademarked a slogan that the team was using before they could and then tried to force the team to buy it from them.

I mean I have no doubt that they would be able navigate any bad PR way better than Denise “Hon” Whiting, but still it may leave a bad taste in a lot of locals’ mouths. Perhaps they will be more hands off with locals using the branding and it won’t really change a thing.

Ravens are usually pretty savvy about PR too.

Valley view is nice and all, fun to walk through and see ornaments, but their tree prices are wack.

To add to all the great answers here the Maryland Curiosity Bureau did an episode on this topic last year and may shed some more light on the subject.

https://www.wypr.org/2021-10-18/whatever-happened-to-baltimores-dollar-house-program

Someone should ask Denise Whiting how this story ends.

They sped like that down MLK yesterday afternoon too and headed on to I-95. Edit: Nevermind, it may have been yesterday morning, the same as you saw. My dog walks are all running together in my head.

NOH!

When I came into town on Harford Rd near 25th st, around 4:30pm there were many police cars on both sides of road with lights flashing but not stopping traffic.

That’s not very charming of them.

Yeah, I'm aware of that and it's a real shame that there is such a lack of accountability actively being enabled from within.

It's been decided by a large segment of the community and political class that criminal enforcement against these people constitutes racism (with the political consequences that follow from that).

I’m going to guess FBI. They would have the matching cars, their office is in the general direction you saw them coming from, and if, for example, there were a possible threat at the Federal Courthouse downtown they would respond like that. They also don’t like telling people when they’ve done something, which is why whether it was a police action or false alarm, it would be unlikely to make the news.

i would guess motorcade, too - perhaps running late?

Yeah, similar story from a friend of mine. He actually got an 8-foot tree and they charged him for a 6-footer.

Not us, though! We got a 6-foot tree at Valley View and paid $100.

Possibly Le Comptoir Du Vin? They had a small grocery selection during the beginning of the pandemic-- it may have stopped now, but I see Normandy Butter on their menu... maybe if you contact the owner, they'll sell you some?

Never seen a crime that required this specific kind of response. They were ONLY black unmarked vehicles.

A crime

The real issue is "charm city" is a defacto geographic location and by itself cannot be trademarked. There are a few other trademarks that contain "charm city". For example "Charm City Meadworks" is a valid trademark.

Don’t you love it when people ignore the point and argue over the not important part? How dare you say it was a focus group!

I could see getting in a battle with duff of charm city cakes

Pretty limited application/scope of use. Doesn’t strike me as a big deal.

I am certain they try keep most legal activity VERY quiet... You would almost never hear about a cease & desist letters. I don't know anywhere you could search for it.

I don't know where to look for trademark lawsuits and I am not in the mood to search through all the lawsuits that the Ravens have been involved in (I am sure almost all of them have nothing to do with any IP stuff).

But here's a list of Trademark applications that the Ravens have opposed/disputed (if you read it over a number of the oppositions were rejected by the US Trademark office... ie: example 1, example 2). This strongly suggests that in some of the legal filings are of the legal "asshole" nature.

However, the idea that we should rely on billion dollar corporations to be stewards of shared cultural "artifacts" really confuses me... and honestly just exposes how the intellectual property legal world is so deeply misaligned with the way I think things should work.

Haha, sorry if that came off as mean- I love your style and this pic! What I meant to say is that what I assume is a fun image you made in your free time is of the same caliber as a professional ad campaign.

Yes.