I attend a meeting of the Trade Marks Committee. I have not done any trade mark work since
they changed the law while I wasn’t looking (perhaps I should have been
looking, but in my defence I was having a baby at the time and was a little
distracted). So, I am not able to
contribute much, but it is good fun listening anyway.
Things have changed in the trade mark world since I was
practising. It was all about exam
reports back then. You filed a trade
mark application; you got an exam report.
The objections were many and varied.
For example, if you tried to register, let’s say, APPLE for computer
software, it would be dismissed as:
- Descriptive for software
relating to apples. (So you would
exclude software relating to apples from your specification of goods.)
- Deceptive for software not
relating to apples. (So you would
also exclude software not relating to apples.)
- Listed in someone’s phone
book.
- The word for something
anatomically inappropriate in some West African tribal language.
- Confusingly similar to MANGO,
which is registered for clothes.
(So you would exclude software not relating to apples but relating
to mangos.)
- In colour.
- In black and white.
- Not part of a series.
- Too high up on the page.
These days, I gather trade mark law is much more focused on
commercial issues like Is the bloke down the road likely to turn up at your
warehouse with a sledgehammer because you’re nicking his customers, or Will you
get away with it on Twitter®? Which I cannot help thinking is slightly
nearer the point.
Anyway, it’s alright because the nice people on the Trade
Marks Committee are going to start writing beginner-level briefing notes on the
major trade mark issues of the day, for CIPA members who would no longer
recognise a trade mark if it crossed the road in front of them. It is perhaps not alright that the Vice-President falls into this category.
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