Intellectual Property Law

Hold the center!

Posted on February 24, 2010
John Thomas at the Pittsburgh IP Law Blog picks up on an interesting phenomenon concerning center-centric trademark registration applications: If the mark you are trying to register contains the word ?CENTER? be prepared for a descriptiveness rejection and a disclaimer requirement if the description of goods contains merchandise...

A fraud by any other name would… well…

Posted on February 22, 2010
While our intrepid brother the TTABlogger resorts to reading entrails, employing dowsing rods and attending seances in his search for the answer to “fraud on the PTO” trademark truth, the crew over at New York’s Kalow & Springut has been laboring every bit as mightily to get their arms around the thing...

Blog obsession

Posted on February 22, 2010
Originally posted 2006-10-19 11:00:08. Republished by Old Post Promoter Be my 500th inbound link. It will make you rich, good looking and young again. Whatever. UPDATE:  It’s somehow different now. Blog obsession ©, .

I tweeted this

Posted on February 17, 2010
I’ve been unusually busy doing legal work in the last few weeks–filing briefs and generally making the world safe for my clients’ righteous activities.  So I have neglected this space a bit. But I am staying on top of things, at least, via Twitter, during stolen moments on New Jersey Transit train platforms and other exotic [...

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They still have those things?

Posted on February 17, 2010
Instapundit: UH OH: Law Review Circulation Continues To Plummet. You’ll notice no one mentioned anything about law review readership. I don’t mean that in a good way. They still have those things? ©, .

Judge: New York Times reporter waived press shield privilege

Posted on February 17, 2010
Originally posted 2006-05-17 10:12:49. Republished by Old Post PromoterThe New York Law Journal reports (subscription required): A New York Times reporter must testify in an emotional-distress case regarding an interview he conducted with the defendant, the Riverside Church’s controversial leader, the Reverend James A...

Scandalous mark by anybama’s standard

Posted on February 17, 2010
Originally posted 2007-02-13 21:41:54. Republished by Old Post PromoterWe’ve wondered aloud here whether there’s any life left in the “scandalous or immoral” ground for refusal of trademark registration. Looks like there’s plenty...

Old media vs. new in LA federal court

Posted on February 17, 2010
Originally posted 2007-05-07 08:35:05. Republished by Old Post PromoterCNET News.com reports: NBC Universal and Viacom have come out against YouTube in a legal case that could help to determine whether the video-sharing site is culpable for copyright violations committed by users...

Secret defrauder ring

Posted on February 15, 2010
I want one, too! What is the FRAUD-O-METER??  Its creator, John Welch, explains: Some say that a picture is worth a thousand words, and that is certainly true with regard to the TTABlog FRAUD-O-METER? brand legal indicator. We all know that the CAFC in In re Bose Corporation jettisoned the TTAB’s “knew or should have known” standard for fraud set [...

Creative destruction?

Posted on February 12, 2010
Sonia Katyal at Fordham Law School sent me a heads-up about an essay she co-authored, posted on the occasion of the Greensboro civil rights sit-ins, called “Celebrating Trespassers” at a minor blog I never read: The Greensboro protesters did not invent the sit-in tactic...

“They’re stealing the language!”

Posted on February 12, 2010
Originally posted 2006-03-20 21:56:37. Republished by Old Post Promoter Writes Boing-Boing: “Super-hero” isn’t Marvel’s property. They didn’t invent the term. They aren’t the only users of the term. It’s a public-domain word that belongs to all of us...

Beverly Hills TM Lawyer

Posted on February 11, 2010
For my money that can only mean Michael N. Cohen!  And now he has a blog, giving it away for free like the rest of us, called TRADEMARK BLOG OF THE TRADEMARK LAWYER’S MIND. Okay, it’s deep, trust me.  Michael knows what he’s talking about from what I can see...

Limits of the Reasonable Man

Posted on February 11, 2010
Originally posted 2007-02-20 16:58:33. Republished by Old Post PromoterConcurring Opinions has an article confirming what I have long suspected: Law and Economics doesn’t really work all that great in the intellectual property department. The fact is, L&E was inspiration for me, as an economics major, to go to law school...

Dean’s World – All right, already

Posted on February 11, 2010
Originally posted 2005-01-07 13:53:00. Republished by Old Post PromoterHere’s a great way to help the victims of the tsunami, per Dean’s World. It’s the right thing to do. Dean’s World – All right, already ©, .

Likelihood of — well, no, actually. Not.

Posted on February 10, 2010
At least in some parts of the country, LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION is something judges actually sometimes don’t find.  Out there, for example.  No, the other side — yeah.  The left.  As Michael Atkins explains: In Sand Hill Advisors, LLC v. Sand Hill Advisors, LLC ? a trademark case involving companies with the same name ? the Northern District [...

Gadget goes gonzo

Posted on February 09, 2010
They embody our passion, our vision and our values . . . They are descriptive of our products on many levels. Firefly is a business given life through ingenuity, hard work, the contributions of our employees and the trust of the many clients we serve...

Texas whiners

Posted on February 04, 2010
Speaking of sports:  In Texas, as you know, everything’s mu-u-u-uch bigger.  That includes NCAA-power-school IP thuggery, explains Eric Johnson, as well as the standard of what is and isn’t chump change: UT has been very aggressive about trademark issues...

“Victimless Crimes” Watch: Clash of the Sleazebuckets

Posted on February 04, 2010
Originally posted 2005-08-01 09:49:08. Republished by Old Post PromoterI’ve said before that we seem to be very picky-and-choosy about the concept of “victimless crimes,” which some people think we should eliminate from the books and merely “regulate...

Overreaching, Part XXVII ? Major League Bozos, confirmed

Posted on February 04, 2010
Originally posted 2006-08-09 10:22:48. Republished by Old Post PromoterSometimes we’re not only right, but a judge agrees with us. The AP reports: Fantasy baseball leagues are allowed to use player names and statistics without licensing agreements because they are not the intellectual property of Major League Baseball, a federal judge ruled Tuesday...

The hammer drops

Posted on February 01, 2010
Originally posted 2006-07-19 19:54:53. Republished by Old Post Promoter The end is near for Leo Stoller.  UPDATE:  Now it’s getting really silly! The hammer drops ©, .

SUPER BOWL® time!!

Posted on February 01, 2010
I was going to skip it this year, honest.  But it really does get even better, not worser.  So, as I started out last year’s Super Bowl post: Every year around Super Bowl time I post an item about the NFL’s overzealous efforts to impose a gridiron grip on all aspects of its somewhat valuable SUPER [...

Geekzone: "Things Are Looking Good"

Posted on February 01, 2010
Originally posted 2005-03-18 16:51:00. Republished by Old Post PromoterSays here that GEEKZONE is now a registered trademark in New Zealand. No word whether MIT (or any fellow travelers) entered an opposition to the registration due to its own prior and well known use of the term “geek...

New Niche for the Numb of New York

Posted on February 01, 2010
Originally posted 2006-01-03 13:05:07. Republished by Old Post PromoterJeff Jarvis reports that a new demographic has been discovered: I had to laugh at this quote from an entertainment exec in Saul Hansell’s NY Times story about Starz offering movies for download...

Patents Must be “Severely Defective” to be Adjudged “Indefinite”

Posted on February 01, 2010
Originally posted 2005-11-07 18:10:40. Republished by Old Post PromoterSpeaking of the Patently-O patent law blog, let’s learn a little patent law. It’s been a while since law school. The claims in a patent must be sufficiently definite so as to provide a standard by which a third party could, with some degree of [...

Web 2.0, but nothing’s changed

Posted on January 28, 2010
Remember the silliness over the attempt by a certain attorney to secure trademark rights for CYBERLAWYER?  The notable part about how that went down was that the foolishness was abated by virtue of a cacophony of webby mockery, a completely virtual beclownment of the first order...

Cutting the baby in half

Posted on January 28, 2010
Originally posted 2007-02-06 01:14:35. Republished by Old Post PromoterNegotiate your browser in the direction of Blawg Review #94! Cutting the baby in half ©, .

Copyright law is hard

Posted on January 28, 2010
Originally posted 2007-02-18 13:48:59. Republished by Old Post PromoterBut it’s hard to have sympathy for the MPAA about its being accused of infringement, since its insane shotgun appraoch to enforcement is so just plain bad. Now as Boing Boing says, the movies people are ripping off other folks’ shareware...

High away, bye-bye

Posted on January 25, 2010
Here’s some of what you’ve missed lately from other smart folks via @roncoleman on Twitter if you’re still pretending that if you draw the shades and turn out the lights it will all just go away: Whence happiness? “A person’s wealth of social relationships...

Ideological purity

Posted on January 25, 2010
Originally posted 2007-01-24 16:18:46. Republished by Old Post Promoter Yahoo News: Chinese Communist Party chief Hu Jintao has vowed to “purify” the Internet, state media reported on Wednesday, describing a top-level meeting that discussed ways to master the countrys sprawling, unruly online population...

New law of trademark dilution

Posted on January 25, 2010
Originally posted 2006-10-06 16:15:10. Republished by Old Post PromoterMy old friends at Kaye Scholer give you the skinny on the new Trademark Dilution Act.  Bottom line:  Good for big companies.  Not so good for defendants. New law of trademark dilution ©, .

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