Australia is the first country in the world to introduce such plain packaging requirements, which tobacco companies have challenged on grounds of trademark infringement, said Minister for Trade and Industry Lim Hng Kiang in Parliament on Monday.

He was replying to Dr Janil Puthucheary (Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC) who was concerned that Singapore’s strict tobacco control measures could be at risk as a result of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade negotiations, given the challenge the Australian government is facing on its tobacco regulation.

The TPP is being negotiated among the United States, Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam.

The case is of Berhad v. GoDaddy,  and the decision was handed down by the Northern District of California on Jan. 3, 2012.

We will let the court describe the facts of the case and its findings.

Having read through the 20 page opinion I would say the court came to the right conclusion and the Plaintiff simply went well in the wrong direction suing the domain name registrar rather than registrant in federal court.  We also have to applaud Godaddy for defending this case, which you can tell from the opinion was not cheap, rather than caving in to the demand of the Plaintiff.

Here is the court statement of the Facts:

“This is a case brought under the Lanham Act, alleging cybersquatting and contributory cybersquatting, and also alleging state law claims of unfair competition. Plaintiff Petroliam Nasional Behad (“Petronas”) is the national oil company of Malaysia, and is wholly-owned by the Government of Malaysia. (Its official website is www.petronas.com.my).”

“Petronas asserts that two domain names,  www.petronastower.net and www.petronastowers.net (the “Disputed Domains”),  which were registered by Go Daddy, were used by one or more non-parties to violate its trademark rights by cybersquatting.”

“Petronas seeks to hold Go Daddy liable for cybersquatting and for contributory cybersquatting, on the basis that the non-party registrant used Go Daddy’s automated systems to point the domain names to a pornographic website that was hosted elsewhere.”

“The court noted that a registrant of a domain name can configure the nameserver so that it routes either to a “record not found” error message, or to a newly created website on a server hosted by the registrar or some third party, or to an existing website already associated with another domain name. This last form of routing is referred to as “domain name forwarding.”

“In May 2003, a third party registered two domain names, www.petronastower.net and www.petronastowers.net (the “Disputed Domains”), with the domain registrar eNom.com (“eNom”), and also pointed – or “forwarded” – the Disputed Domains to a preexisting website featuring pornography.

“For most of the time between May 29, 2003 and November 11, 2006, at least one of the Disputed Domains was directed to a website displaying pornography. On April 1, 2007, the then-registrant – Heiko Schoenekess – changed registrars from eNom to Go Daddy.”

Schoenekess used Go Daddy’s online “dashboard” to automatically forward the Internet traffic for the Disputed Domains to the same pornographic website with which they had previously been associated.

“It was not until November 26, 2009 that Petronas learned that the domain name petronastower.net had been registered with GoDaddy.com, by a third party. Petronas asserts that it immediately advised Go Daddy of the unauthorized use of the “petronastower” name, and requested that Go Daddy cease its “direct and contributory infringement” of Petronas’ mark.”

“Go Daddy responded on November 30, 2009, stating that it would not tolerate illegal content on its customers’ websites, and would cooperate with law enforcement to get any such websites taken down.”

“Go Daddy further informed Petronas that any disputes over the ownership or wording of the domain name itself will need to be sent to either the registrant, through an arbitration forum such as World Intellectual Property Organization . . . or the local court system.”

“Per ICANN regulations, domain registrars are prohibited from becoming involved in domain ownership disputes.”

“Nevertheless, instead of utilizing an arbitration procedure, which it had successfully used previously, Petronas submitted a trademark claim to Go Daddy on December 16, 2009.”

read more: http://www.thedomains.com/2012/01/07/federal-court-holds-in-favor-of-godaddy-in-suit-for-cybersquatting-contributory-cybersquatting/

The others are Singapore, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Colombia, Russia and Ukraine also posted double-digit IP filings.

Intellectual property filings rose significantly worldwide in 2010, underscoring global innovation initiatives driven mainly by the United States and China despite the global economic crisis, according to the latest report released by the United Nations World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO).

The report provides an indication of strong growth in intellectual property filings worldwide in 2010 despite the global economic crisis plaguing advanced nations and developing countries.

The report highlights the strong rebound in IP filings after the 2009 slump.

Patent application filings were 7.2 per cent higher in 2010 over the previous year. This was the highest growth rate in five years compared to a 3.6 per cent decline in the previous year.

WIPO director-general Francis Gurry said the increase in IP filings showed companies across the globe have continued to innovate despite the difficult economic conditions.

“This can help create new jobs and generate prosperity once macro-economic stability is restored,” he said in the report’s foreword.

Gurry also cautioned that “if economic conditions were to deteriorate sharply in the short term as happened in 2009, companies might be forced to abandon their investments in innovation, stifling an essential source of growth.”

Total number of patent applications worldwide rose by 7.2 per cent, reaching 1.98 million, while trademark filings increased by 11.8 per cent, touching 3.66 million, both all-time high figures according to WIPO.

Computer technology, electrical machinery, audio-visual technology and medical technology accounted for the largest share of patent filings worldwide.

source from : http://www.bernama.com.my/bernama/v6/newsbusiness.php?id=638263

Patent number 8,082,523, called Portable electronic device with graphical user interface supporting application switching, is interesting because it seems so specific while in fact also being very broad:

A method, comprising: at a portable electronic device with a touch screen display: displaying on the touch screen display a first user interface for a phone application during a phone call; detecting activation of a menu icon or menu button during the phone call, in response to detecting activation of the menu icon or menu button, replacing the first user interface for the phone application with a menu of application icons including an icon for the phone application and an icon for a non-telephone application; maintaining the phone call while displaying the menu of application icons on the touch screen display; detecting a finger gesture on an application icon in the menu of application icons other than the phone application icon; in response to detecting the finger gesture on the application icon other than the phone application icon, displaying a corresponding application user interface on the touch screen display while continuing to maintain the phone call and modifying the corresponding application user interface to include a switch application icon that is not displayed in the corresponding application user interface when there is no ongoing phone call; detecting a finger gesture on the touch screen display on the switch application icon; and in response to detecting the finger gesture on the switch application icon, replacing display of the corresponding application user interface with the first user interface for the phone application while continuing to maintain the phone call.

This patents the entire process of switching between a call and an app (and back again) on the iPhone. But what’s interesting is that the more you read this patent, the more you realize how cunning it is. It’s not impossible for someone to develop a method for switching between a call and apps that wouldn’t violate this patent, but the existence of this patent could very well make it hard for the solution to be an elegant one.

read more: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/hardware/apple-granted-patent-on-using-apps-during-calls/17407?tag=nl.e539

Patent and Trademark Infringement Case

A technology and services leader in interactive media marketing, on Thursday announced that the U.S. District Court of New York reactivated its patent and trademark infringement case against AOL, Time Warner and Platform-A. The case was filed in 2009.

AUGT said that Hon. Judge Sweet of the U.S. District Court in New York scheduled a pretrial conference for January 25, 2012 for the case. AUGT had filed the lawsuit alleging that AOL, Time Warner and Platform-A are infringing on U.S. Patent No. 6,594,691 and U.S. Patent No. 7,269,636.

Augme Technologies also claimed that AOL infringed on its trademark. The company is seeking injunctive relief and as yet unspecified damages from the alleged infringement.

read more: http://www.smallcapnetwork.com/Augme-Technologies-Patent-and-Trademark-Infringement-Case-Reactivated-AUGT/s/via/7474/article/view/p/mid/1/id/43/

If you wish to register trademark in Malaysia, please click on contact menu. Other countries also available.

A court in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen ruled that Apple lacked “supporting facts and evidence” for its claim that Proview Technology (Shenzhen) was infringing the US company’s iconic tablet computer trademark.

Apple declined to comment when contacted.

Proview Technology (Shenzhen) is owned by a Taiwanese company that registered the trademark name “ipad” in several countries including China as early as 2000, years before Apple began selling the iconic tablet.

Apple paid 35,000 pounds ($53,400) for the global trademark right in 2009, but Proview Technology (Shenzhen) retained the Chinese rights, the official Xinhua news agency said.

The companies have been embroiled in a legal battle ever since, it said.

A company charged with restructuring the debts of Proview Technology (Shenzhen), which is on the brink of bankruptcy, said after the ruling that Proview would seek 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion) from Apple for copyright infringement, Xinhua said.

read more: www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-08/apple-loses-china-ipad-trademark-case/3721268?section=world

Matthew Nadeau, the brewery’s president and co-founder, said one of the state’s largest beverage stores immediately boycotted Hansen’s beverages. “This is the biggest store in the state and they’re standing behind us, so we knew we weren’t going to fight alone,” Mr. Nadeau said.

That story spread on social and traditional media and Vermont’s senators, Bernard Sanders and Patrick J. Leahy, got involved. Mr. Leahy wrote legislation that required the government to survey how trademark law is used by large corporations, though Mr. Nadeau lamented that it was not distributed widely enough to solicit many responses from small businesses. The two sides eventually came to an agreement without litigation, and Rock Art continued to use the Vermonster name.

Chick-fil-A sent Mr. Muller-Moore a warning once before, in 2006, but did not pursue that matter. Now, Mr. Muller-Moore and Mr. Richardson are awaiting a response from the company, and they plan to continue with their trademark application.

In a statement, Chick-fil-A said, “We must legally protect and defend our ‘Eat mor chikin’ trademarks in order to maintain rights to the slogan.”

read more : http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/05/us/eat-more-kale-t-shirts-challenged-by-chick-fil-a.html

The red wax seal atop a Maker’s Mark bottle makes the bourbon stand out on store shelves. Whether the bourbon company can keep that distinction is up to a panel of three federal judges.

The U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday stepped into the sticky arguments over whether Maker’s Mark can keep a trademark on the wax seal and enforce an injunction stopping any other liquor company from using a similar top.

Maker’s Mark won an order in 2010 awarding it exclusive rights to the dripping wax seal. U.S. District Judge John G. Heyburn II in Louisville granted Maker’s Mark an injunction prohibiting any other company from using a similar seal and look, saying the bourbon maker held a valid trademark.

The order ended a seven-year long lawsuit between Deerfield, Ill.-based Fortune Brands, which owns Maker’s Mark, and London-based Diageo North America and Casa Cuervo of Mexico, which used a dripping red wax seal on special bottles of its Reserva tequila. Fortune Brands has since split its liquor business into a new company called Beam Inc.

The appeals court did not give a timeline for deciding the case.

Maker’s Mark attorney Edward T. Colbert said the seal serves no purpose other than to make the bourbon bottles distinctive and that Cuervo doesn’t need to use it.

“What they have here is a competitive desire to use the wax, not a competitive need to use wax,” said Colbert, the brother of comedian Stephen Colbert.

Attorneys for Diageo and Cuervo argued that using a wax seal wouldn’t cause customers to confuse the company’s tequila with the bourbon or believe the two companies were affiliated.

“Wouldn’t it be a logical assumption that the same company made the two products because of the red wax seal?” asked Judge Karen Nelson Moore, looking at a bottle of Maker’s Mark and a bottle of Cuervo brought into the courtroom.

“They know exactly where that comes from,” Cuervo attorney Michael Aschen said of the tequila. “They’re not going to get confused and think it comes from Kentucky.”

The Samuels family, which created Maker’s Mark in 1958, trademarked the distinctive seal, which serves only a decorative purpose.

Cuervo opted to include a dripping wax seal on bottles in 1997 as part of an effort to create an artisan look. The bottles of Reserva with the new seal entered the U.S. market in 2001 in a limited production of 3,000-to-4,000 bottles. The bottles remained on sale in the U.S. for about three years.

Maker’s Mark, bottled in Loretto in central Kentucky, sued over the seal in 2003, claiming it violated the long-standing trademark. Cuervo dropped the dripping wax seal six years ago.

source : http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iqCDKniz_s9utK-P-MbBerlWrczw?docId=3d612c0b15bc44f2b15c24e6b4a572cd

The suit, filed in U.S. District Court, complained Florida-based Hard Rock Café International has recently opened a small events room called “The Cavern Club” in one of its Las Vegas locations.

Hard Rock Café International owns restaurants, clubs, casinos and hotels around the world and also licenses that name.

The Cavern Club in Liverpool said in the lawsuit that it is a “legendary nightclub” that opened in 1957. In 1961 the Beatles made their first appearance there and would go on to perform there nearly 300 times, the suit says.

It says the Cavern Club has also hosted the Rolling Stones, the Yardbirds, the Kinks, Elton John and The Who.

The lawsuit indicates the Cavern Club and the international Hard Rock company have butted heads before over the Cavern Club trademark.

The Cavern Club owns the trademark rights to that name in the United Kingdom, the 25 European Community nations, Australia, Hong Kong, Brazil and Canada, the lawsuit says.

But Hard Rock Café International has a U.S. trademark for the Cavern Club name and Sunday’s lawsuit sought to overturn a Sept. 29 decision upholding its U.S. rights to the mark.

That decision was made by the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, which dismissed the Cavern Club’s challenge dating to 2005 to that trademark registration.

Besides the Las Vegas location using the Cavern Club name, Hard Rock has a club in Boston that has also used the Cavern Club name for a special events room and performance space, the lawsuit says.

The suit calls the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board decision rejecting the Cavern Club’s challenge of the Hard Rock-owned trademark “erroneous” and says Hard Rock’s use of the name “is likely to cause and has caused confusion, mistake or deception” as to whether the Hard Rock-owned venues are affiliated with the U.K.’s Cavern Club.

Besides alleging trademark infringement, Sunday’s lawsuit alleges violations of Nevada’s deceptive business practices act and alleges common law unfair competition.

read more: http://www.vegasinc.com/news/2011/nov/27/hard-rock-caf-chain-faces-las-vegas-trademark-laws/

The trademark was field for on November 23. According to Fusible, the serial number for the trademark app is 85480030. The trademark covers a gamut of geek products including telephones, smartphones, mobile phones, and tablet computers. That seems to cover just about anything that Samsung might want to make.

There has been no official comment form Samsung on the trademark app. We are left to our own devices to figure out what the gadgets might be like. I would like to see a very thin tablet rocking a high-resolution display and Tegra 3 power on Android 4.0. That would be a very interesting tablet in deed. I would bet this is the name of the next Galaxy device to land after the Galaxy Nexus launches.

source: http://fusible.com/2011/11/samsung-files-trademark-for-samsung-galaxy-sleek-smart-phones-and-tablets/