New York Patents Legal Questions

Patent law would not prohibit your reselling the article even if covered under a design patent or utility patent. You would not infringe the copyright by reselling the shirt. However, you could not, without permission, make copies of the logo separate from the shirt. The main goal of trademark law is to prevent customer confusion as to the source of the trademarked goods, i.e., am I buying from the company or from someone else? Redecorating the shirt and yet retaining the company logo would likely constitute creating customer confusion. Thus, you would want to remove the logo. Likewise as to customer confusion, if, for example, the shirt itself has a distinctive configuration or shape (such as a feature of the sleeves) that consumers have come to associate with the company logo, then reselling the redecorated shirt might  create customer confusion and thereby infringe upon the trademark. Also, be careful in your advertising not to say anything that might mislead consumers, e.g., regarding the origin of the shirt itself. To avoid trademark dilution if applicable, I would hesitate to, without permission from the company, mention in your advertisement that company as the source of your shirts. Provided the shirt itself does not have the above-mentioned distinctive configuration or shape that consumers have come to associate with the company logo, you are free to remove the trademark (design and words if any) from a shirt you have purchased, to redecorate the shirt, and to then resell the shirt.  ... Read More

A plus is a former programmer or someone with a computer science background/education. The more specific their knowledge/experience is to what you are doing, the better. One approach is to search the U.S. Patent Office roster of practitioners (attorneys and agents). To do this navigate on uspto.gov to Finding a Practitioner. You can search in your location, because you probably want to see the practitioner in person to better explain your invention. As a rule of thumb, the lower the practitioner's registration number, the more years of patent experience. Go on the practitoner's/firm's website to learn more about her/their credentials/capabilities. There is also the following to consider, which may or may not apply to your situation. Practitioners hear all the time about ideas for which the implementation details are thin or missing. Certainly the practitioner's skill comes into play and is likely one of your key considerations, but keep in mind that at the end of the day either you have a fully formed idea or not. Think of it like this. If you are explaining your idea to an ordinary telecommunications systems designer (or fill in the blank) and they still do not know how to build an implementation of your idea without putting in ingenuity of their own, then it was not a fully formed idea to begin with and was not enough to proceed with writing a patent application. Your invention mus be explained in the patent application in such clear terms that one of ordinary skill in the art would know how to make and use your invention without undue experimentation. Finding the best practitioner to write and prosecute your patent application (which is what was just discussed) is one, and an important, milestone. Other important goals are finding funding, if you need to; assessing the market for your invention; and obtaining other intellectual property such as trademarks. The same patent practitioner, or other sources, e.g., business lawyers, potential licensees, can assist you in this regard.... Read More

A patent does not give you the right to make, use or sell anything. It only allows you to prevent others from making, using or selling what is covered by the patent. Therefore, unless there is a patent in Europe that would prevent you from making, using or selling the product in Europe, you would not have to pay royalties to the company that owns the US patent so long as the product is not made or sold from the US to Europe.... Read More

First of all, it appears that you have a copyright issue, not a patent one. Unless you registered your pictures with the Copyright Office within 90 days of putting them up on your website, you have lost the right to statutory damages and attorney's fees, but you could still get an injunction against use of your pictures. It appears that you are indicating that the other person is using your information pictures on his website to sell a competing product to one that you are selling. If that is the case, you potentially could also have a case for unfair competition. i suggest that you contact an attorney who specializes in copyright and unfair competition cases to discuss your situation with in greater detail.... Read More

If the trademarks on the products have been registered with U.S. Customs, the counterfeit goods could be seized and destroyed upon entry into the United States. Furthermore, the Trademark Counterfeiting Act provides penalties of up to five years imprisonment and/or a $250,000 fine ($1,000,000 fine for a corporation or other legal entity) for selling or attempting to sell counterfeit goods or services and these penalties increase for a second or subsequent conviction under the Act. You would be very wise to make sure that the goods you intend to sell are not counterfeits given the above noted penalties.... Read More

Copyrighting an app or other software has more to do with the appearance of the code than the appearance of the software. If chunks of the code are copied and you had access to the code, there is an inference of copyright infringement. If you get to the same result using code that clearly suggests you did not copy the code, there is no inference of copyright infringement. The appearance of the game can have the same result. If, with all the other puzzle games out there, the average person looks at the appearance of your game and thinks it was copied from Quell (not exactly copied, but copied and modified), you could have a copyright issue with the appearance of the game. The fact you are discussing making a puzzle game similar to Quell instead of just discussing making a puzzle game and being aware there are many out there is a bit of a red flag. It is ok to make a puzzle game because you were inspired by Quell, but don't make a game that feels like a derivative of Quell.... Read More

1) you don't need any patent - there is never a need to acquire a patent for a product. If you have something novel captured in the product and you want to make sure others cannot reproduce it, then you need a patent to achieve that objective. 2) No. Building designs can be copyrighted and, while I'm not sure if a toy could ever infringe an architectural copyright, a copyright can only be infringed by copying, not be designing something that happens to be similar to something someone else designed previously. Good luck, Todd... Read More

It is impossible to give any opinion without actually looking at the original work and comparing it to the design you want to use. However, no one can have the sole right to use something like the New York City skyline in a copyrighted work. What you can't do is copy an existing design that is currently protected by copyright. It may be a good investment to have the search run at the United States Copyright Office to see what design was ever protected by copyright - if the copyright was not renewed, you may be able to use it. However, you also refer to a"logo" which falls under trademark law, not copyright law. You also need to search the United States Patent & Trademark Office database to make sure your logo design is not "confusingly similar" to a registered trademark. It is also a good idea to have a trademark search run for nationwide state registrations and "common law" trademarks, since trademarks do NOT have to be registered with the USPTO to be enforceable. Running a trademark search will likely be more expensive than running the copyright records search.... Read More

At this time, copyright does not protect fashion designs. However, copyright does protect photographs taken of anything, including fashion designs. If you take the photograph of the other fashion design, it may be okay. But you could get in trouble if you post a picture someone else took, like the original manufacturer. There are also other issues, such as whether the original manufacturer's trademarks are visible in the photograph that you need to be aware of before you use the photograph. You also need to consider your market - in Europe, for example, designers DO have copyright protection in their fashion designs. There may be other facts as well that would be uncovered when you talk to someone knowledgeable in this field that could affect the conclusion. ... Read More

If the product is unchanged, you cannot obtain a patent on the product simply based on your proposed new use.  However, if you can convince the patent office that it would not have been obvious to use this adult product with children, e.g.,because children would be using it in a vert different manner unrelated to its use by adults you might be able to obtain a patent on the new method of use of the product..... Read More

Patents restrict what others can do, but the lack of a patent in one country (or jurisdiction, e.g., Europe) cannot give rights to someone in another country. Thus, using your example, the fact OLED products can be legally manufactured in Japan and Korea would not enable those products to be brought into the U.S. if they are covered by a valid U.S. patent.... Read More

It sounds like your relationship has broken down. Not attending to the dispute may harm your position, so I would definitely try to get back to taking care of business, and if your judgment is that you need another attorney, you should act promptly. You have the right to your files, and if you are going to pay your bill, you should have no trouble getting them. You should have any new attorney speak with your current attorney, so that you can minimize any negative effects of the change.... Read More

Once the game was published, for example given out, this may be considered to be making it public. This could result in loss of patent rights, although this is a very fact intensive analysis and depends on exactly what happened and when. Such an analysis requires professional assistance. In any case, if the provisional patent application is filed within one year of the earliest possible date of publication, rights will be preserved. The copyright is not adversely affected by publication.... Read More

Here are some points to consider as you discuss this matter with your patent attorney. * There is more than one way to claim an invention. Three of the most common types of claims are apparatus or device, process or method, and product-by-process. * Method claims, as a general principal, are limited to a specific function or process. Article or device claims may or may not be function limited. For instance the article claim may simply be directed to a device having element A, B, C etc. * The breath of any claim depends on the prior art and the statements made in the patent specification and during patent prosecution. It may be the case that your invention can be claimed in a manner that covers multiple functions or end use applications. One of the things you and your patent attorney will discuss during initial disclosure meetings is just this point. Drafting an initial application and claims to address and cover multiple end use applications and functions is one of the things that patent attorneys really strive for. Good luck and let us know if there are further concerns or questions.... Read More