New Jersey Intellectual Property Legal Questions

The process of registerting a trademark involves two steps.  First, you file a trademark application, then you wait until the Patnet and Trademark Office assigns an examiner to the case and the examiner typically issues an Office Action.  After that, the applicant and his/her attorney try to address the issues raised by the trademark examiner.  At ADLI law we charge a flat fee of $2,500 for the entire process, excluding responding to substantive office actions.  The substantive response may be required if the trademark examiner rejects a trademark application based on "likelihood of confusion."  Feel free to contact me if you have any furtehr questions.... Read More

The foreign language song is likely protected by copyright law both in the country where the song was recorded and also in the U.S.  You would not be permitted to record your own version of the song without obtaining permission from the copyright owner, and it does not matter that your intended purpose is noble.  If you proceed without getting permission, then you subject yourself to a copyright infringement risk.  By associating the charity with your plans, the charity may also face copyright infringement liability simply by being a beneficiary of your fundraising.  The best way to shield the charity from potential risk is by not recording the song without permission.    ... Read More

Squatting on a domain name with the intent to extort money from someone else who owns the trademark rights has been an issue. You would need to show the domain name holder knew of your registration and purchased the domain to keep it from you until you paid for it. Your situation is clearly different. Based solely on the facts you have described, I don't think you are in a situation to seize any domains or twitter handles. Good luck, Todd... Read More

One way to approach this issue is to copyright your software. If you copyright your software before they publish a copy of your software, you can collect statutory damages for their infringement of your work and attorney fees if you litigate. Statutory damages can range from $750 to $250,000.00 per incident. Copyrighting software is relatively cheap and can be completed for less than $1,000. Whereas patent infringement litigation is ridiculously expense and trademark infringement litigation is rarely lucrative, copyright infringement litigation is regularly cost-effective and profitable if you register your work before the infringement occurs. Good luck, Todd... Read More

It would be copyright infringement to copy someone's album to Facebook without the permission of the author or owner of the copyright. The fact someone posted the album on YouTube does not change that equation.  Even if it was legally posted on YouTube, you still cannot copy the album unless you have permission. You may be able to post a link on Facebook to a YouTube site that contains the album. At that point you are not copying the work, you are only providing an online address. If YouTube takes down the album, then the link would be useless. Someone might be able to make the case that by posting the link, you are engaging in contributory infringement, but I have not heard of that argument being made successfully. Good luck, Todd... Read More

If you have "example" trademarked and you own the URL "example.com", there is minimal value in registering example.com as a trademark. The exception would be if you used .com as part of your trademark (and not simply as a web address to buy your goods/service). I've got a brief jingle rolling around in my head where someone sings "hotwire.com". They are making the .com part of their consumer recognition. They should register "hotwire.com". I never see Apple advertise themselves as Apple.com, so they would not get any material benefit from that registration. Also, keep in mind that someone else could register example as a trademark for goods/services unrelated to yours. Think of Delta Faucets and Delta Airlines, both of whom own Delta for their goods/services. A made up word, like Kodak, is going to receive broader protection, but it would probably be a mistake to think no one could ever use the same or a similar name for a completely different purpose.... Read More

Trademark infringement is all about consumer confusion. Does a consumer see the T10A service mark and think tirefAkers is related to Carmetal, maybe a subsidiary? If the T10A mark confuses the consumer into believing their may be a relationship with the companies, you have trademark infringement. If there are enough other distinguishing elements that consumers are simply not confused, no infringement. There are other ways to obtain trademark infringement, such as through dilution, but consumer confusion is the most likely theory in your scenario. Hope that helps, Todd... Read More

Mikhail, It depends on what you are trying to protect. If you have an invention and you use an attorney to patent the invention, the patenting expense could be anywhere from $5000-$20,000 by the time the patent issues and depending who you hire. Complex chemical/pharma patents will cost even more. If that isn't an option for you, Nolo Press used to put out (and may still) a DIY book on patenting and/or you could look for a law school with a patent clinic that might help you. If the idea is a work of art (music, sculpture, architecture, writing, etc.), you can copyright it at www.copyright.gov. That expense is $40 if you do it on your own and hundreds of dollars if you use an attorney. If your idea is neither patentable, nor copyrightable, you may still be able to protect the idea as a trade secret with contracts to maintain its confidentiality while you work to find ways to exploit it. For these types of ideas, you want to be first to market and positioned to make most of your money within a couple of years of hitting the market. After that, if you are successful, someone will come along and copy your idea while undercutting your price and likely push you out of the market. Good luck, Todd... Read More

Virtually every successful film in "Hollywood" receives numerous demands or lawsuits alleging infringement of copyright. I would estimate less than one in one hundred succeeds, perhaps less than one in one thousand. If you registered your script with the Writers Guild and if you registered your screenplay with the Copyright Office you may have a chance, but then, finding a lawyer to handle this on a contingent/percentage fee will be very, very difficult and if paid by the hour will cost a "fortune".... Read More

For an invention to be patentable, it must be new, useful and "non-obvious", which means that it can't be just in insubstantial improvement over what has been done before. I always recommend that you have a patent search run initially to see what other people have tried to patent in your field before you start spending money trying to protect it. Many patent applications are filed and many patents are granted on inventions that never end being commercially used, so just because you haven't seen it in use doesn't mean someone didn't think of it already.... Read More

This is a question that invokes the "fair use" exception to copyright infringement. In a non-profit setting where multiple copies are not being made and there is no obvious economic detriment to the copyright owner, such a use may be okay. It is impossible to state a categorical rule with respect to "fair use" because all such determinations are intensely fact-dependent.... Read More

In general, it is perfectly lawful to display a link to another party's web site. However, like everything else, context matters. If the manner in which you display the link suggests inappropriately that your goods or services are endorsed or sponsored by, or originate with, the other business, then you may have a trademark infringement issue.... Read More

As a general matter, a person in the United States who is lawfully in possession of information and who has permission to copy it from the owner will not be subject to prosecution in another country for acts lawfully committed in the United States. Your facts are a little thin, and by beefing them up you might change the result.... Read More

There are no "international" trademark registrations. In certain countries such as the United States your trademark rights may be enforceable simply if you use the trademark in that country. In other countries, you must register the trademark in each country in order to have enforceable trademark rights. There are some situations where you can apply for a single registration that applies to multiple countries, such as the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market of the European Union (http://oami.europa.eu/ows/rw/pages/index.en.do). You can file for a CTM (Community Trademark) with the OHIM and, if it is granted, the registration will apply to all 27 Members States of the European Union and will automatically extend to the new Member State(s) without additional fees. At present, it sounds as if your registration is only valid in France. However, if you use the trademark in the US, you may have "common law" rights even without registration.... Read More

In a word, no. The owner of the copyright in the song (i.e., the composition) as well as the owner in any existing recording of it that you plan to copy (i.e., the phonorecord, in Copyright Act terms) controls the exclusive right to reproduce the copyrighted work. You may not generally distribute copies of it without permission.... Read More

The issue is whether or not Publicreuters is considered to be confusingly similar to Reuters. In my mind, the question would be whether the public would recognize that Publicreuters corresponds to Public Reuters, and if so, would they be mislead into believing that the website is owned, sponsored or endorsed by Reuters as opposed to merely news that has been reported by Reuters. Also, if it appears that you are trying to benefit from the value of the Reuters name to draw the public to  your site, that will work against you as well  That Reuters is a German surname I do not see to be an issue since Reuters has long established itself as a well known source of news information. Is there some reason that you find it necessary to incorporate the Reuters trademark into your domain? The quote you cite has nothing to do with trademarks and relates only to copyrights and the right of others to use reported factual information. ... Read More

In order to qualify for protection under applicable intellectual property laws, you would need to demonstrate that your packaging system contains elements of both non-obviousness and novelty. The overwhelming likelihood is that you could not meet either showing, but it would be worth discussing your plans with an attorney. Even if not patentable, you might have a sufficient competitive advantage to have your product be commerically successful. Good luck with it.... Read More

You are generally privileged to publish ordinary business correspondence addressed to you. One possible limitation on this privilege is that works of authorship are subject to the author's copyright. Since you plan on including only an excerpt, and since it does not appear that the sender has any particular economic interest in the uniqueness of the expression contained in such correspondence, you should be able to make so-called "fair use" of this excerpt.... Read More