July 6, 2009
There is a minefield of information to steer through for small businesses aiming to build an outstanding online brand.
They need sufficient understanding of trade mark and internet law to name their business effectively. Should they ch...
July 14, 2009
Are you currently in the process of registering a trade mark for your brand? Everything can be ticking along smoothly until the day you receive a letter from the registry saying that your application has been opposed. What to do next? ...
October 1, 2009
The UK Trade Mark Registry offers a trade mark application service called Right Start, which has been available since 2009.
Under the Right Start service applicants will be able to test whether their trade mark will be accepted by e...
May 21, 2010
In the early days of the internet when the web was like a small village which has just one bread shop, one toy shop or one other type of store, it was understandable that businesses were drawn to names like toys.com or books.com or hot...
June 28, 2010
Some time ago Coca Cola registered COKE as a trade mark for soft drinks both in the UK and USA.
So, I was interested to hear from my daughter that the term ‘coke’ is commonly used as a general reference to fizzy drinks throughout the ...
July 2, 2010
In business, as in life, we are constantly assessing and managing risks. One of the most important risks to avoid is that of choosing your brand name without doing some very careful searches.
I know this from personal experience.
W...
August 9, 2010
In a notable article, the IPKat drew attention to the fact that there is a marked separation between the worlds of trade marks and branding.
More often than not the two are not addressed collectively, but are rather dealt with by com...
September 10, 2010
Businesses are often surprised to learn that trademarks, unlike domain or company names, do not have to be the same to prevent others from using or registering them. Similar names are also covered. Some interesting examples of ho...
September 27, 2010
In a competitive market setting your products apart from other people’s is key to maintaining an edge. Product design is often an important characteristic of a brand. It could even be the USP of the business.
Where, however, the ...
October 25, 2010
A trade mark can be refused where it is descriptive of the goods and services it covers. This could be where the mark ‘designates the kind, quality, quantity, intended purpose, value or geographical origin’ of the goods or service o...
One aspect of online business that is particularly difficult to grapple with is copyright, be it, use of content from other sites, or copyright relating to photographs and images or other issues. The misinformation that surroun...
February 28, 2011
In deciding whether to file a trademark application to protect your domain name, the first step is to determine whether you use your domain name as a trademark. If your domain name is only used as the Uniform Resource Locator (“U...
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