Widow of longtime MAD artist Don Martin can go forward with mark infringement, publicity rights claims over publications that occurred within Florida’s four-year catch-all statute of limitations. The widow of MAD Magazine cartoonist Don Martin is not time-barred from pursuing trademark infringement and publicity rights claims against the publisher of MAD and DC Comics, to…
Tire maker entitled to recover on injunction bond for wrongful prohibition on sale of certain brand tires. The federal district court in Yakima, Washington, correctly ruled—on remand and in accordance with a prior instruction—that leaving a preliminary injunction in effect after trial was wrongful, the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco has held. However,…
The Canadian Intellectual Property Office (“CIPO”) published two new practice notices on Monday, May 3rd, 2021, dealing with expedited examination and improving timeliness in examination. The prospect of expedited and more timely examination will be welcomed by trademark owners, frustrated with extended delays in examination. Expedited Examination Beyond very limited opportunities for marks covering goods…
In a recent decision by the First Board of Appeal, Gleissner’s Sherlock Systems satisfied the test for abusive practice in its attempted revocation of the mark, KEYNOTE. Gleissner is infamous within IP circles for his large portfolio of domain names, companies and trade marks, with seemingly little to no goodwill as a foundation. The strategy…
Lengthy use by the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam of its unregistered marks was not enough, by itself, to raise a triable issue as to the marks’ protectability. A church that calls itself the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (the “Unified Church”) failed to show that its asserted trademarks had acquired secondary meaning and therefore…
Can coffee be hell? Of course, bad coffee, we knew that. On the other hand, the General Court (GC) has recently confirmed that the sign “HELL” can be protected for coffee-related products as an EU trademark (Hell Energy v EUIPO, T-323/20, available in French and, for the adventurous ones, in Hungarian). The applicant, Hell Energy…
Can the name of a historical, well known place be registered as a trademark? If we think about the NEUSCHWANSTEIN case (C-488/16), the answer is: yes, it can be registered, provided there is no connection between the designated goods/services and the famous place. But what about the “allure” associated with a well-known site? Should anyone…
Use of analogous state-law limitations period for Lanham Act Section 43(a) claims was “unsatisfactory”; summary judgment order finding Bayer’s false association and false advertising claims time-barred was vacated. Reasoning that a district court erred by reading a limitations period into the Lanham Act where none existed for Section 43(a) claims, the U.S. Court of Appeals…
The Swedish Patent and Market Court (PMD) ruled out a likelihood of confusion between two figurative trademarks for “ghost” and “GHOST VODKA” based on their mere visual differences. In fact, the Court concluded that the sigs were dissimilar, without even analyzing the signs on a phonetical or conceptual level. A good outcome for the defendants…
The TTAB acted within its discretion in weighing evidence of functionality and alternative designs. The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board had sufficient evidence to find that two box designs for electric cables and wire to prevent tangling submitted by applicant Reelex Packaging Solutions, Inc. were functional and not entitled to trademark protection as trade dress,…
