On June 30, amidst the traditional flurry of end-of-term opinions, the Supreme Court issued its decision in the first case to have been argued before it via teleconference, United States Patent and Trademark Office et al. v. Booking.com B.V. In addition to making history in the remote-work era, this case caught the attention of trademark lawyers and some mainstream media;… More
The American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA) and Foley Hoag are pleased to invite you to an open roundtable discussion with USPTO officials Meryl Hershkowitz (Deputy Commissioner for Trademark Operations, United States Patent and Trademark Office) and Larry Stanley (Interlocutory Attorney, Trademark Trial and Appeal Board).
Topics will cover a range of USPTO trademark operations, procedures, and policies, including the recent and upcoming changes to representation of foreign applicants,… More
The Federal Circuit just issued its en banc decision in Nantkwest v. Iancu, concluding that the proper statutory construction of Section 145 of the patent statute, which allows patent applicants to file actions in a federal district court to challenge the denial of patent applications by the Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), does not require the challengers to pay the USPTO’s attorneys’ fees.… More
This article was published first in Cannabis Industry Journal
While the USPTO might not register your trademark, there are still some tools available to protect your intellectual property.
Federal trademark registrations are invaluable tools for emerging businesses. They put the world on notice of a company’s name; they can secure nationwide priority over others using similar names; they distinguish a product in the marketplace;… More
I never paid a lot of attention to Flag Day, until the year that my daughter was born on June 14. Now Flag Day is a special day for our family, and of course there is a lot of flag waving on Independence Day which comes hot on its heels. So this seems like a good time to review the rules on when you can register and use images of flags as trademarks.… More
We used to have a Thanksgiving turkey tradition at the Trademark and Copyright Law Blog. Just before every fourth Thursday of November, we’d type in our LEXIS NEXIS password and find a judicial opinion from a turkey trademark case. We covered the 2007 genericide of the TURKEY STICK, explained the 1976 GOBBLE GOBBLE dispute, and even discussed the 1981 fight over BAKED TAM.… More
Earlier this month, KISS guitarist Gene Simmons filed an application with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (“USPTO”) to register the “devil’s horns” hand gesture, which he routinely flashes at rock shows, as a trademark for “entertainment, namely, live performances by a musical artist; personal appearances by a musical artist.” This bold move brings up a number of interesting questions, ranging from “Does the gesture really function as an indicator of source that points to Simmons?” to “How will he ever enforce it?” to “Can you really claim trademark rights in a hand gesture?” For a number of reasons,… More
Anna Jarvis led the efforts to establish the first official celebration of Mother’s Day in 1908, during which she honored her own mother, Ann Maria Reeves Jarvis, a Civil War-era social activist. But about a dozen years after that first celebration, Anna Jarvis had become the holiday’s most vocal opponent. Why? Commercialization. The floral and greeting card industries had already taken over her idea,… More
Although marijuana is becoming legal to varying degrees in an increasing number of states, your chances of getting a marijuana trademark registered with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) are still grim. In order to register a trademark with the PTO, the applicant has to show that the goods or services with which the mark will be used are permitted under federal law. Therefore, until marijuana gets reclassified by or removed from the federal Controlled Substances Act,… More
January 2017
Happy holidays and welcome to the 2017 New Year edition of Trademark Red Tape, our periodic round-up of trademark news and happenings at the United States Patent & Trademark Office. Here are the highlights:
Today’s example of unintentional sexism comes to us from Section 2(c) of the Lanham Act. On its face, the language of the statute assumes that someone other than Hillary will win the 2016 presidential election – and it won’t be Jill Stein. It could be Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Gary Johnson, or your dad, but it’ll be someone male.
Section 2 of the Lanham Act,… More
Regular readers of the Trademark and Copyright Law Blog and our Trademark Red Tape™ column may recall our previous report on a pilot study by the United States Patent & Trademark Office (PTO) about post-registration proof of use. Under current PTO practice, a specimen demonstrating use of a mark on a single good or service within a class is sufficient to maintain registration for an entire class,… More
June 2016
Welcome to Trademark Red Tape, our periodic round-up of trademark news and happenings at the United States Patent & Trademark Office. Here are the highlights:
March 2016
Welcome to Trademark Red Tape, our periodic round-up of trademark news and happenings at the United States Patent & Trademark Office. Here are the highlights:
Imagine, for a moment, a successful software company, Agave, that owns the trademark PHOTOCHOPS for a popular image-editing program. Being a diligent trademark owner, Agave registered the trademark PHOTOCHOPS in 2005, right when the original PHOTOCHOPS launched, in connection with “downloadable computer programs for creating and manipulating graphic images on a computer” in International Class 9. Over the years, the PHOTOCHOPS platform slowly shifts from downloadable software to a pure software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform,… More