Interest Groups Using Letters
 

As a spin-off from the "pledges wearing letters" thread.... and a question decadence had:

What are your feelings on interest groups using the group they are interested in's name, letters, symbols, etc.?

"NO, NO"

There are rules by law to follow! They as an interest group may incorporate some of the Letters or are Colonized by A Certain National.

Many of these are covered by Law!

Re: Interest Groups Using Letters
 

That sounds disrespectful, and like a possible copyright infringement.

Point exactly!:)

Legal Reasons
* By using the name of the group, you are perpetuating yourselves as a member of that group. Even if there was an "interest group" tacked on, you're still giving the image as being sanctioned and a part of the bigger group, regardless of whether or not you actually are. This creates HUGE liability issues

*Trademark/copyright infringement- most groups have their symbols, name, etc. registered as trademarks/copyrights, etc. Only members of the group may use them. This is also why people who manufacture products with GLO names on it, etc. must be licensed

Nonlegal reasons

* It's presumptuous.
* It's disrespectful to the members of the organization.
* It creates problems if you end up not becoming a part of that group.

As far as letters, absolutely not until you're officially a colony of the national org.

As far as colors, mascots etc....well if pink and green and turtles have meaning to you, and you picked them not knowing DZ used them, that is one thing. But when you pick things solely because the national group you want has them, it can often backfire on you.

i forget the letters of the sorority, but there was a local who used almost everything AZD -- including "al fuzzie", our old mascot. their letters were even like ours, i think it was like alpha zeta delta... or something. it was rather infuriating to us, becuase they played it off as if it was their own original idea. i dont know if HQ ever got hold of them, but it just looks bad. i agree, if you unknowingly copy someones colors or mascot, okay... but if you want to become a colony of sigma kappa, and use sigma kappa pi, how does that look to other national groups you might be appling to? i just think that would backfire.

No, no, bad idea.

If you're an interest group and want to have something to identify yourselves by, by all means pick a name and some colors and symbols to use - something that's meaningful to your group. You don't have to go all out and form a local fraternity with rituals etc., especially if you really want to focus on going national. But don't use the name of the national you want to affiliate with - it's presumptuous, and could lead to legal problems.

***snort***

need a tissue?

Re: Interest Groups Using Letters
 

Since they'd have no clue what any of the stuff meant, I'd find it almost humorous. Colonies are another story. I wouldn't mind someone calling themseleves a "Sigma Nu interest group". Anything beyond that, I'd mind.

I have heard a lot of interest groups that pick similar names to the glo they want to affiliate with. There are a couple of examples I can think of on my campus. In the 50's before we were originally chartered by AEPhi we were APhiE local sorority. Before the Alpha Xi Delta chapter affiliated I believe they were Alpha Zeta Delta. Then we have a local sorority on campus and I was told the reason why they chose the name Alpha Sigma and the colors green and yellow is because when they were founded they had wanted to affiliate with AST.

Our AEPhi colony (which used to be an SAEPi colony) uses a lot of AEPhi's traditions, that ok?

heck yeah, if they're an official colony.

Well, they're still just known as Alpha Epsilon, as in, local.