Trademark

TM is for Trademarks

IP lawyers like beer, at least this one does.  So, we also like to write about beer trademarks.  Here’s one you can drink to.  The Irish Times recently reported that the city of Munich has filed a new European Union trademark application for OKTOBERFEST, hoping, we assume, to profit from licensing the name to the countless […]

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Trademarking Hashtags Originating in Twitter as a means of designating keyword search terms, the # (hashtag) has become a ubiquitous symbol of the social media age.  As the political season heats up, tweeting has gone wild with political candidates and their supporters exchange 140 character barbs.  This hyperactivity has spilled over to print and digital […]

Brewery small

Over the past several years, the question of what’s a “craft beer” and who qualifies to make a craft beer has been a front and center issue among the brewing community. It started when “Macro Brewers” began making “small” batch brews such as “Blue Moon” manufactured and sold by the “Blue Moon Brewing Company,” a […]

Kit Kat Trademark wrapper

In late 2013 we wrote about a trademark dispute between the Hershey Company and Mars Inc. over whether Mars had trademark rights in the cross-section of its Snickers candy bar. Hershey opposed the mark on grounds that it was merely descriptive, de jure functional, generic, and failed to function as a trademark. The cross-section of […]

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It’s not very often that the United States Supreme Court decides a trademark issue but this month the Supremes delivered an opinion on a question of trademark law called “tacking.” So what is “tacking?” If you know, you probably should be reading a more advanced blog, but if you don’t, tacking is a doctrine for establishing […]