| Trademarks and Secondary Meaning |
| To be treated as a trademark a mark must have a certain quantity of distinctiveness. A mark that is not inherently distinctive is entitled to legal protection only if the mark acquires a secondary meaning that distinguishes the goods/services it represents from the goods/services of another. A descriptive mark that is initially unregisterable may achieve trademark status and be subject to registration after sufficient use has been made to prove secondary meaning. More... |
| The First Sale Doctrine |
| A copyright owner's right of distribution is limited by the first sale doctrine, which is an exception to the Copyright Act. The first sale doctrine is a legal principle that limits the rights to control content after a work has been sold for the first time. The first sale doctrine states that once a copyright owner sells a copy of his or her work to another, the copyright owner relinquishes all further rights to sell or otherwise dispose of that copy. More... |
| Reissue of Patents |
| Once a patent is issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), the patent is essentially final; however, if an error is found in the patent as issued that affects the scope or validity of the patent, a patent holder may seek a reissue patent, provided that the error was not made with deceptive intention. Errors that may warrant the reissue of a patent include a defective specification, a defective drawing, or any other problem that causes the patent to represent more or less than the patentee had a right to claim in the patent. If the patent as issued is narrower than the patentee had a right to claim, the patentee has failed to obtained the full amount of patent protection to which he or she was entitled. If the original patent is broader than the patentee has a right to claim, the entire patent may be vulnerable to a challenge to its validity in an infringement action. By broadening the claim or properly circumscribing it, as the case may be, the reissue patent allows the patentee to improve the ability to enforce his or her patent rights.More... |
| WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property |
| The first successful attempt to establish international rights to intellectual property was the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, which was first adopted in 1886 and was modified several times. The Convention is presently administered by the World Intellectual Property Organization. Although U.S. copyright law was significantly different from that established by the Berne Convention, resulting in the United States' refusal to accept the Convention for several years, the United States changed its copyright laws quite significantly in the 1970s and subsequently signed the Convention. A major criticism of the Berne Convention was its lack of enforcement mechanisms. More... |
| Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy |
| On October 24, 1999, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) adopted the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP). ICANN is a nonprofit organization that has assumed the responsibility for IP address space allocation, protocol parameter assignment, domain name system management and root server system management functions previously performed under U.S. Government contract. The UDRP is part of the Registration Agreement that Internet users sign to register domain names in the global top-level domains. Trademark owners may elect to file a complaint under ICANN's UDRP. The UDRP is a fast-track procedure under which a victorious trademark owner receives an order from an arbitration panel that the domain name be cancelled or transferred to the trademark owner. More... |
Mauro Law Offices, P.C.
