Stealing Mickey’s Mojo
Mark Schultz After a busy summer finishing a paper on copyright and social norms (thanks to Eric for the plug!) and dodging angry deer on SIU’s campus, I’ve returned for more guest blogging. Sooner or later, a blog on marketing…
You Don’t Know Jack
By Mark McKenna The Seattle Post-Intelligencer has a story about SparkNet’s attempts to enforce trademark rights in the name of a radio show format (SparkNet refers to the format of a mishmash of musical artists and styles as “Jack”). SparkNet…
My Famous Blog Post (R)
By Mark McKenna A couple of days ago I received an email from Restoration Hardware advertising its Famous Fall Lighting Sale(R). On top of my mild annoyance at yet another piece of spam, I couldn’t help but ask: “Are you…
City of Heroes Lawsuit–New Ruling on False DMCA Takedown Notices
By Eric Goldman Marvel Enterprises v. NCSoft Corp., CV 04-9253-RGK (C.D. Cal. Aug. 23, 2005). Given the interest in this case, I’m surprised that this ruling appears to have been overlooked (I found it through BNA [subscription required]). In late…
Branded products as ingredients
By Mark McKenna Brett Frischmann tells a story about trying to buy his son a cookie with M&M’s on it and having the person working at the cookie stand insist on calling the cookies “B&B” cookies, not M&M cookies. According…
When a guitar is just a guitar
By Mark McKenna The 6th Circuit today released an interesting decision restricting the application of initial interest and post sale confusion doctrines, at least in the context of product configuration. Gibson Guitar Corp. has manufactured its Les Paul line of…
IP and Cognitive Psychology
By Mark McKenna William Patry has an interesting post over at his blog about how courts go about determining substantial similarity in copyright infringement actions. The post resonated with me for a couple of reasons. First, I always have great…
GEICO and Google Settle
By Eric Goldman Reuters reports that GEICO and Google have settled their lawsuit. This development isn’t particularly surprising given that the judge practically ordered them to settle. The terms of the settlement are confidential, so we can only speculate what…
Roundup Not Ready
By Mark McKenna In another example of trademark enforcement on steroids, we have Monsanto’s recent demand that the author of the Bitter Greens Journal blog stop using Roundup Ready as the header for a series of blog posts. See Overlawyered…
More on Rappers and Car Dealers
By Mark McKenna In the name of not being left out of the interesting discussion about Snoop Dogg’s trademark lawsuit against Gary Barbera (not to be confused with Hannah Barbara, of Flintstones fame), I thought I would put in my…