Intellectual Property Law

Topical tweets

Posted on August 24, 2009
Here are some topical tweets by others of likely interest to LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION® readers that I’ve passed along to members of my Twitter social network in the last couple of weeks: @melaniejhoward: Ex-wife and daughter of Gucci heir forbidden by court from TM use of own surname http://bit...

Not just any Schadenfreude!

Posted on August 24, 2009
No, better – it’s the RIAA kind. Really, who doesn’t hate those guys, already? Originally posted 2007-08-01 00:35:30. Republished by Old Post Promoter

You know it’s not a crime any more when…

Posted on August 24, 2009
… even the judges are doing it? Originally posted 2006-06-07 17:26:12. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Internet Strategies for Legal Professionals

Posted on August 24, 2009
That’s the name of the seminar I’m giving in Princeton tomorrow through the National Business Institute.  (I knew I’d “teach at Princeton” some day.)  I presented it in northern New Jersey last week and I’m hitting Cherry Hill, New Jersey (a Philadelphia suburb) next Tuesday...

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Triple chocolate!

Posted on August 21, 2009
Truly scrumptious:  Speaking again of “what’s not to love?,” check out this lede from Pamela Chestek on the topic of comestible love itself slathered with gooey IP: If you’re interested in trademark management in large enterprises, or management of large enterprises in general, there’s an interesting decision in a multidistrict antitrust case against the chocolate candy [...

Last Friday of the year.

Posted on August 21, 2009
Times Square Skyline Originally uploaded by Likelihood of Confusion. Go home early. You?re not likely to confuse anything else this year. Originally posted 2006-12-29 12:41:50. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Pardon our Appearance

Posted on August 21, 2009
… and surfeit of bloggery while we jiggle, switch and realign in terms of hosting, software and graphics. It happens to the best of us, and we are, of course, among the best. Of us. Originally posted 2005-09-14 11:43:02. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Why abduct us? We cede our values for free

Posted on August 21, 2009
Mark Steyn asks: Did you see that video of the two Fox journalists announcing they’d converted to Islam? The larger problem, it seems to me, is that much of the rest of the Western media have also converted to Islam, and there seems to be no way to get them to convert back to journalism...

“Litigation is the continuation of business by other means”

Posted on August 21, 2009
From West (I have added links): Trials and legal proceedings in courtrooms play out as a battle of words and wills. In Litigation Is War, a new book published by West Legalworks?, Frederick L. Whitmer suggests that the winners in litigation also may be determined by who best applies the fundamental principles of military strategy...

The Google exception?

Posted on August 19, 2009
Way back when the Google Books issue first burst forth, I expressed considerable skepticism that their plan to scan the universe of books and put it on line could be described as anything besides copyright infringement.  As I wrote in my firstest post on the topic nearly four years ago: It sounds like copyright infringement to me [...

Co-opting the blogosphere

Posted on August 19, 2009
Glenn Reynolds has a roundup on the latest New York Times outrage regarding the phony story they ran on U.S. abuses in Iraq that, evidently, didn’t happen, as the paper now admits. Yes, we all make mistakes, but if all my mistakes were in the same direction, you’d accuse me of bias, wouldn’t you? That’s [...

Defamation online

Posted on August 19, 2009
It’s our future.  Instapundit rounds up developments, which Julie Hilden is all over.  I’ve made my point on this topic — less a legal than a cultural observation. Originally posted 2006-12-11 21:43:28. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Vote already

Posted on August 19, 2009
I find the idea of electioneering in the these things unpleasant. But coming in last would leave an unpleasant taste in my, mouth, too. So help me prove I have friends — and that IP blogs deserve a moment in the sun! — and cast your vote for LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION® as Best Law Blog in the [...

Insight Into the Google IP Beat

Posted on August 19, 2009
My old firm Pitney Hardin has a neat analysis of how the Google patent just might help you figure out how Google works. I said you. The very thought of it makes my brain hurt. Originally posted 2005-06-23 23:32:20. Republished by Old Post Promoter

What is a word mark?

Posted on August 19, 2009
Speaking of Google and trademarks, an interesting article on Google’s own trademarks is this:  Don’t “Hitchhike”A Ride On Google’s Trademarks and URLs by Russell Shaw. Only thing is that he defines a “word mark” as “similar to a trademark, but more of a logo than a business name,” which it isn’t...

Trumpmark®

Posted on August 19, 2009
Does it get any better/ worse than this? The Smoking Gun reports: Fearful of a dilution of his powerful brand, Donald Trump is fighting his ex-wife Ivana’s bid to trademark [register as a trademark] her name for use in the real estate business. U...

Maine Blogger defamation suit developments

Posted on August 19, 2009
Evan Brown sums up the legal issues as this case lights up the blogosphere, and then some. UPDATE: And then some more. UPDATE:  It’s all over.  Originally posted 2006-05-05 10:33:49. Republished by Old Post Promoter

Nominated for Stupidity, Kind of

Posted on August 19, 2009
Mike Bates reports that he’s been

Blawg Review from the Great Pacific Northwest

Posted on August 18, 2009
Blawg Review this week is hosted by one of us (thanks for the link!) — Michael Atkins, the one and only Seattle Trademark Lawyer, whose blog engagingly still features his high-school yearbook picture. As I’ve said so many times before, what’s not to love?

Copyright’s absolute liability?

Posted on August 18, 2009
Michael Ratoza of U.S. IP LAW reports (via @BeelJDPhD) on a case that issues a somewhat stunning ruling for those of us, such as LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION®, who have never really thought about the question of common-law indemnification for copyright infringement — or, worse, who have thought about it a little and assumed it must exist...

Knockoff News Forty-Two

Posted on August 18, 2009
Check it out, bub. Originally posted 2006-12-04 22:52:40. Republished by Old Post Promoter

After the deposition

Posted on August 17, 2009
After the deposition Originally uploaded by Ron Coleman Cooling my heels.

It never ceases to amaze

Posted on August 17, 2009
John Berryhill writes, on the “INTA List”: Now everyone is getting in on the act… Since large scale domain tasting has largely been stopped, the way is clear for internet service providers to intercept queries seeking non-existent, non-registered domain names, which largely consists of users who have made typographical errors, and to engage in mass “virtual typosquatting”...

Three years ago in CONFUSION: “Is Google a utility?”

Posted on August 13, 2009
I posted this in August, 2006. I don’t think the question has been answered yet: We wrote about the Kinderstart lawsuit against Google, claiming an unfairly depressed Google search rank, last March. There have been further, very interesting, developments, exemplified by this this colloquy reported by Dawn Kawamoto: David Kramer, a Wilson Sonsini attorney also representing [...

Two years ago in CONFUSION: Going underground

Posted on August 11, 2009
This picture, from two years ago this month, links to one of the most popular blog posts on LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION®.  It’s probably linked to numerous health risks as well, but you buys your sandwich, you takes your chances — and your cholesterol, your calories …...

A year ago in CONFUSION: “The ultimate license”

Posted on August 10, 2009
LIKELIHOOD OF CONFUSION® is on vacation this week, which, for those of us old enough to remember the concept, obviously means one thing:  “Summer reruns”! This item from August 2008 struck me as at least superficially reminiscent of the present Kindle Kontroversy, wherein it turns out Amazon was remotely deleting books already downloaded onto customer’s Kindle [...

The DMCA and the search engine

Posted on August 06, 2009
Traverse Legal: Mary Roach has a great post at CircleID on an area that we have talked about extensively, namely, copyright takedowns under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.  Mary?s post covers the more specific strategy of sending takedown notices to search engine providers, such as Google, Yahoo, and MSN, to effectively reduce access to stolen creative materials...

Head of State

Posted on August 05, 2009
Sounds almost ordinary enough at first — this tweet from @EFF: Another Obama image fair use controversy: http://bit.ly/vhWCk Oh, sure. Another vhWCk?!  What are you, stoned? Whoah, no.  Much better!  No, no, no. Oh, ma-a-a-a-a-a-a-n!: Don’t worry, it’s only a cigarette! They were cheap back then! It was only a matter of time before someone combined a certain memorable [...

Tall orders

Posted on August 04, 2009
It’s always something, isn’t it.  Here’s the latest shipwreck-in-the-making — you can’t call tall ships tall ships any more, matey: The age of wooden ships and iron men is long gone.  We appear to be square in the era of tall ships and stupid lawyers...

Cajuns cooked

Posted on August 04, 2009
Attorney Scott Wolfe, flush with victory, sends along this update on the Louisiana lawyer advertising rules I blogged about last fall, when I said, “Get that?  According to this, everything posted online by a Louisiana lawyer ? and God help a Web 2...

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