So I just discovered US Patent and Trademark Office website today, thanks to a DP member. p; I'm doing some trademark searches, to see if I could begin to understand why some companies can trademark terms that were already trademarked... like Charter Communications... it confused me when they first popped up because there was already a Charter hospital or whatever. So I search for the word "paragon," and the results have just confused me further. In addition to stuff like "Paragon Software" and "Paragon Publishing," I see just the word "Paragon" alone, over and over. And they are all marked "live." How can I make sense of it...
There are different CLASSES of trademarks. So several companies can use the same mark, in different classes, each having an exclusive right to use the mark within their class of business.
About the only time that you'll run into trouble with a trademark is when: 1) You're dealing with a huge company... For no reason, you should ever start up a website, regardless of theme, and use the name of a big company... microsoft.yoursite.com is not a good idea...Laws change when you get that kind of money, and it shows...You, for instance, could not open www.microsoft.to even if your company had nothing to do do with software... 2. The use of similar slogans and symbols of socially familiar things... Michael Buffer has trademarked "Let's Get Ready To Rumble," a phrase he says before sporting events...The WWF had to become the WWE and so forth...Simply said, if what you're trying to trademark is a household name, forget about it... 3. Potentially slanderous or damaging association, or name bartering... As browntwn said, there are different classes of trademarks...You can't open a site www.microsft.com to draw traffic to your site due to mistyped URL's...And right when domain names became the trend, I believe whitehouse.com was a porn site... It's tricky, so its best to have something unique to help deviate from the trendy or popular...
That's why God gave us Intellectual Property lawyers. Also, that website is NOT a complete search. Again, that's why you want an IP lawyer if you're serious.
You might want to read about Apple (Corp.) vs. Apple (Computer): http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/sep2004/tc20040930_9317_tc056.htm They've been battling over use of the "Apple" trademark since 1981. In the latest round Apple won. There's also the notorious Monster Cable, that goes after anyone who uses the word "Monster" in their business name: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monster_Cable#Trademark
Have u heard the name Nike, Adidas, Puma, Bossini................There are so many words all over the words they are their trademarks. Again Just Do it, in case of Nike/Impossible is nothing in case of Adidas etc are also fall under trademarks. Microsoft, Firefox Mozilla, Yahoo, Hotmail, these all are trademarks. You can not do any business taking name from such famous words and u can not indulge in similar business taking their name is trademark protection. Did u understand something?
Nah, some lawyers just have an angel and a devil bugging him/her. Angel: Do the right thing! Do the right thing! Devil: Screw the bastard! Milk him/her! Up to the lawyer to decide who to follow.
No. You're thinking about divorce lawyers. Plus, lawyers are just following the orders of their clients.
Hehe, yeah, it's just like the cops. You love them when they're saving your ass from the bad guys, and you hate em' when they got you at the side of the road writing you a speeding ticket!
A general method for assessing the distinctive character of a mark is to consider a consumer's reaction to a mark. The mark may only be inherently registrable if the consumer has never encountered the mark before. On the other hand, the mark is unlikely to be inherently registrable if it informs her about any characteristic of the relevant products or services (eg. whether they are delicious, large, spicy, black or sweet, in the case of fruit). In any other case the mark may not be registrable.
Maybe I can put together some info about trademark classes from the USPTO website. One thing that frustrates me constantly: If a media buying company uses the trademark, for example, Salmonella Media... is it okay for a competing company to use something like Simple Salmonella Media? p;
I think in certain cases it is, and other cases its not. With deep enough pockets, any company can win in court if they claim you are infringing on their trademark. I know I've heard that for example, if one company has "The Pizza Place" and another has "John's Pizza Place" and yet another has "Little Pizza Place", they're all entitled to use those trademarks (Something I saw on Food Network one time, there is actually a bunch of pizza joints in New York all named Ray's. They all go by variations like "Famous Ray's" "Original Ray's" "Famous Original Ray's". There is a wikipedia article that talks about the whole thing, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray's_Pizza , it makes for a pretty humorous case study on trademark law. There's a ton of grey area, but one thing is clear is if it is obvious that you are trying to capitalize off of the "good faith" that somebody else has established with their name, you are infringing. If "Simple Salmonella Media" is in the exact same realm or a very similar realm as Salmonella Media, its likely they'd say its infringement. If one sells cd's and the other makes commercials, then how I understand it is they are seperate enough to both own their seperate trademarks. Then again, as mentioned before, any fortune 500 trademark is pretty much spoken for, and they WILL beat you down!