One of the signs of a healthy trademark is a certain level of distinctiveness. Distinctiveness is related to consumers’ love and recognition of a mark as an indicator of a product’s source, such that consumers trust the mark...more
Thank you for reading the July 2023 issue of Sterne Kessler's MarkIt to Market® newsletter. This month, we continue our three-part series that closely examines ways to lose trademark rights with a discussion of genericide. We...more
Sean Combs Opens New Front in War Against GBG Sean John - Accuses majority holder of using election-related trademarks to sell goods - Puffy Prologue - The lawsuit between Sean John Combs (AKA Puff Daddy, AKA P. Diddy, AKA...more
Have you ever been to an indoor cycling class? If so, you most likely have heard the term “spin class,” or referred to the act itself as “spinning.” Mad Dogg Athletics, Inc. would take offense, however, calling such uses...more
By Andy Halaby The Supreme Court’s decision in United States Patent & Trademark Office v. Booking.com to take up whether booking.com is generic, and thus unprotectable as a trademark, is intriguing....more
A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol, design, color, sound, or a combination thereof, that serves to identify the source of goods or services from those of another. Questions frequently arise about how trademarks should be...more
With the end of the year approaching and the holiday shopping season in full swing, now is an ideal time for brand owners to audit their trademark portfolios. ...more
A “generic” term for a general class of products or services cannot be used as a trademark or service mark for the goods or services in those class(es), because the function of a trademark (or service mark) is to identify and...more
Just Google it. Can you Google the score? Have you Googled the restaurant’s reviews? These are all common phrases in today’s internet-reliant society, and it’s entirely due to the creation of Google and its widespread...more
Death by genericide is a painful way to go, for trademarks that is. When the public comes to think of a trademark as the common word for a product or service -- as opposed to identifying its exclusive source -- the trademark...more
Domain name registration is usually a good first step to cement trade name and mark ownership. In a previous blog we reminded readers that possession, even in Intellectual Property matters, is nine-tenths of the law...more
In a well-reasoned opinion, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals recently held that the GOOGLE trademark has not suffered death by genericide – even if the public uses it as a verb for searching the Internet. The case before...more
On May 16, 2017, internet search engine and content provider Google Inc. was handed a win by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Elliot v. Google Inc. The court ruled that the GOOGLE trademark had not...more
You may know that “aspirin,” the word commonly used to describe acetylsalicylic acid, was once a trademark – i.e., brand name – for the acetylsalicylic acid made by one company: Bayer. The word “aspirin” lost its trademark...more