Influencer Loses Trademark Ownership Claim to his Alias Name WallStreetBets as a Social Media Account Moderator on Reddit

It is well settled that social media users who create original content and post it on social media (YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, presently known as X) own intellectual property (IP) rights, namely copyright, to that content.  Content usually means text and audiovisual works such as videos, images (photos) and audio (for example, music and songs). The social media platform simply holds a license to use that content, as the platform’s terms of use ordinarily state.  

What about trademarks?  The case is Jaime Rogozinski v. Reddit Inc., case number 3:23-cv-00686, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California seemingly stands for the proposition that this principle does not apply to trademarks under which the platform’s  users operate their social media accounts on that platform. Put differently, the platform owns the account’s name.  Because the platform itself hosts that account, the platform itself, therefore, “uses” that account in commerce.  “To acquire ownership of a trademark it is not enough to have invented the mark first or even to have registered it first; the party claiming ownership must have been the first to actually use the mark in the sale of goods or services.”  This appears to be the gist of the case Jaime Rogozinski v. Reddit Inc., which is also known as the WallStreetBets case.

On June 12, 2025, the Ninth Circuit refused to revive Jaime Rogozinski’s lawsuit against Reddit, a news aggregation and forum social media platform.  In his lawsuit, commenced on February 15, 2023, Mr. Rogozinski asked the District Court to declare that he owned WALLSTREETBETS as the name of its account (known as “subreddit”), which he launched in January 2012 on Reddit. Mr. Rogozinski also asked the Court to find Reddit liable for infringing his WALLSTREETBETS trademark.  Among other claims, Mr. Rogozinski also claimed that Reddit breached its user agreement when Reddit “permanently suspended him from being a moderator of the WALLSTREETBETS forum he created.”  The District Court dismissed Mr. Rogozinski’s complaint for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.  The Ninth Circuit ultimately affirmed the dismissal.

The dismissal of the complaint on this ground is most embarrassing for plaintiff’s lawyers.  The U.S. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure are considered to be quite liberal and flexible. (Relatively speaking.)  Plaintiffs are simply required to put a defendant on notice of what it is being accused of and state the legal grounds for such accusation.  No need to prove anything at this stage, called “pleading stage.”  Dismissal of the complaint under Rule 12(b)(6) means insufficient or deficient pleading, or both.  Did the lawyers for Mr. Rogozinski really did such a poor job?

Curiously and not uncommonly, the parties also are fighting each other at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) Trademark Trial and Appeal Board over who should register the WALLSTREETBETS trademark.  Also at issue is the WSB mark, the shorthand version of WALLSTREETBETS.

The facts in this case do not appear to be in dispute.  On January 31, 2012, Rogozinski, “under the username ‘jartek,’” created the “r/WallStreetBets” subreddit, a “forum where people share stock and other financial advice” and on which Rogozinski served as its first moderator. By early 2020, the r/WallStreetBets subreddit “had grown to more than 1 million subscribers, earning recognition from the financial press,” thanks largely, if not exclusively, to the effort of Mr. Rogozinski.  At the end of January 2020, Rogozinski published a book, WallStreetBets: How Boomers Made the World’s Biggest Casino for Millennials, and posted, on the “side bar” of the r/WallStreetBets subreddit, “a link to purchase his book on Amazon.”

On March 24, 2020, Rogozinski filed an application with the USPTO to register the mark WALLSTREETBETS for use “in conjunction with online and print publications in the fields of trading and finance, clothing items and providing an online forum for financial and trading information.”  Two weeks later, on April 7, 2020, Reddit “sent a notification to [Rogozinski] that his account had been placed on a seven-day suspension for ‘attempting to monetize a community.’”  It also stated that he was “no longer permitted to moderate communities on reddit” with any account. Subsequently, on May 11, 2020, Reddit filed its own application with the USPTO to register the mark WALLSTREETBETS. Reddit uses the above image as a sample of use of the mark (“specimen").

What harmed Mr. Rogozinski’s case is his initial admission that “Reddit uses the WALLSTREETBETS trademark in commerce by operating the r/WallStreetBets subreddit’”, that he did “not allege his own use of the mark for any purpose prior to January 31, 2012”, the “date on which [the r/WallStreetBets] subreddit was created”, and, indeed, that he did "not assert he was the first to use the mark in commerce.”  Thus, priority was not in dispute.  In light thereof, the Court found Rogozinski “fail[ed] to plead ownership rights in the WALLSTREETBETS mark.”

Mr. Rogozinski apparently also made mistakes by failing to timely file to register the WALLSTREETBETS trademark and including wrong services in his intent to use trademark application(s).  In particular, one of his applications opposed by Reddit (Serial No. 88-845638) contains the following services: “Providing an on-line forum for securities, options, futures, and financial instruments, including stock trading, bond trading, futures trading, options trading, forex trading, and/or commodities trading,” in Class 38.  Was/is Mr. Rogozinski really providing an online forum (telecom services)?  That would be almost the same as if MrBeast* would have claimed that he provided “audio and video broadcasting services over the Internet, namely, uploading, posting, showing, displaying, tagging and electronically transmitting information, audio, and video clips.”  These are the YouTube services (rightfully) claimed by Google LLC.  MrBeast was smart enough to register his trademark solely for “Entertainment services, namely, providing online non-downloadable videos featuring stunts, pranks, challenges and monetary giveaways” and clothing.  (*Jimmy Donaldson, who goes by the online alias MrBeast, is an American YouTuber and businessman known for his expensive stunts, giveaways, and philanthropy.)  I am not a Reddit user.  So, it is hard for me to tell but there appears to be a distinction between, for example, how Google is treating its YouTube influencers, on the one hand, and Reddit is treating its influencers by claiming trademark rights in their account names to itself, on the other hand.

As a takeaway for influencers, Mr. Rogozinski should have been strategic in his trademark filing.  Had he obtained a trademark registration for WALLSTREETBETS mark for narrowly defined goods and services, he would have had the legal presumption of his trademark rights.  The Court would have been unlikely to dismiss his complaint at the pleading stage. Perhaps the Court probably would have given him an opportunity to develop his case against Reddit through document discovery and witness depositions and possibly given him a “day in court.”

The takeaway for social media companies is that they should take a close look at their terms of use, moderator’s policies and user agreements.  These should be clear as to who has the social media account’s trademark ownership and control.  The specific wording in those policies and agreements might really come into play and in fact support the influencer’s trademark rights in his account name (alias).  The Court in California arguably has been more sympathetic to the social media company than to the influencer and social media’s user.  A court in another jurisdiction or a different judge in the same court might not be so sympathetic. 

#socialmedia #influencers #trademarks #Section230SafeHarbor #USIPlaw

Text © 2025 Maxim A. Voltchenko

** This piece is not intended to be a review of U.S. law or court practice.  This article may not necessarily represent the views of the author’s employing law firm.  Although every effort has been made to verify the accuracy of items in the Sputnik Blog®, readers are urged to check independently on matters of specific concern or interest.