| Nicknames as Trademark Subject Matter |
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| A trademark is occasionally varied by the public in both speech and written usage to an abbreviation of or a nickname for a company's name or trademark. A company can claim trademark ownership of such a name even if the company neither created it nor publicized it. This protection coincides with the rationale behind trademark law, which is protecting against consumer confusion. Sometimes the public modifies recognized names and marks either by shortening a longer mark for purposes of convenience, such as the use of "Coke" for a Coca-Cola beverage or by adopting a nickname because of the appearance of a product and/or a desire to colloquialize a trademark, such as "Bug" for the Volkswagen Beetle automobile. A company can secure trademark protection for an abbreviation, acronym, or nickname conferred by the public if it can show that the purchasing public associates that nickname with the company or identifies the company as the source of products bearing that nickname. The company may prevent another entity from using a mark that is confusingly similar to the new term even though the company itself has not made public use of it. More... |
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| Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998 |
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| Part of the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works of 1886 provided that copyrighted works be protected for the duration of the author's life plus no less than 50 years. The European Union extended the 50 year protection to 70 years in 1993, and the United States did the same on October 28, 1998, with the signing of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA). CTEA allows works still under copyright in the United States to be granted copyright protection for the duration of the author's life plus 70 years for individual works and corporate works. Works published before January 1, 1978, are protected for up to 95 years. Works-for-hire, anonymous, or pseudonymous works are protected for 95 years after publication or 120 years after creation under CTEA. The Act is named after the now-deceased songwriter and singer Sonny Bono, who had lobbied for copyright extension. CTEA is also known as the "Mickey Mouse Act" because one of the biggest proponents of the bill was the Disney company. CTEA does not retroactively apply to works for which copyright protection had expired as of October 28, 1998. More... |
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| Jurisdiction and Procedure in Patent Disputes |
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| A patent gives the patent owner an exclusive right in the subject matter of the patent. If another person or company makes, uses, sells, offers for sale, or imports the subject matter of the patent, that other person or company is said to be infringing on the patent rights of the patent owner. The patent owner in such a situation may wish to have the infringing conduct stop or may be entitled to monetary compensation for the infringing conduct. Because the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has no jurisdiction over a patent once it issues it nor has any enforcement powers with regard to patent rights, the ordinary course of action to take against an act of patent infringement is to bring a lawsuit in court. In addition, a non-patent owner who believes that a patent issued by the USPTO is not valid may bring a lawsuit to challenge the validity of that patent. More... |
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| The Digital Perfomance Right in Sound Recordings Act of 1995 |
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| The Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings Act of 1995 (DPRA) created a new limited performance right for certain digital transmissions of sound recordings. More... |
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| The Doctrine of Equivalents |
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| When a patent is applied for, the inventor must include a specification, which is a written description of the invention, the manner and process by which the invention is made, and the manner and process by which the invention is used. A specification concludes with a claim or claims that particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter that the applicant asserts to be the invention to be patented. One of the purposes of claims is to put the public on notice as to what inventions have been patented and may not be patented again. Therefore, the language of claims are exceedingly important in a patent application because, in the event of a patent dispute, the language of the claims will define the scope of the patent protection. Ordinarily, even if patentable, any part of the invention that is not included in the claims will not receive patent protection. Each claim must conform to the description of the invention set out in the specification. More... |
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