March 2015

Debbie Laskey, MBA

Is your industry crowded? Does one brand overshadow the rest of the players in your industry? How can your business stand out? Here are five tips every business can learn about branding from recent data breaches.

With countless stories centering on the recent Sony and Anthem data breaches in the

Last week, while I was preparing for and had the unique opportunity of arguing a real, live TTAB final hearing on the merits, outside the TTAB’s typical oral hearing location (because it was selected by the TTAB to be part of the ABA’s IPLSpring continuing education conference in Bethesda, Maryland), the Supreme Court issued its

You may, like me and hundreds of others, have had the “Blurred Lines” verses: “I know you want it, You’re a good girl, You’re far from plastic, Talk about getting blasted, I hate these blurred lines,” stuck in your head. And, who could forget the new word “twerk” with Robin Thicke’s performance with Miley Cyrus

A commonly used forum to resolve trademark registration issues, which also commonly resulted in negotiated settlements over the use of mark, may no longer be so common. Today, the United States Supreme Court issued its heavily anticipated opinion in the B&B Hardware v. Hargis Industries case, which involved the issue of whether TTAB decisions on

– Draeke Weseman, Weseman Law Office, PLLC

Last week, the Chicago Sun Times profiled Loeb & Loeb attorney Douglas Masters, the NCAA’s outside counsel in charge of trademark enforcement during March Madness. Licensing the official sponsorships is big business, and enforcement demands require Masters to send out hundreds of cease-and-desist letters to both accidental infringers

Continuing our ramp up toward the launch of our Strategies for Owning Your Product Designs webinar next week, I’ve been thinking a lot about the Morton-Norwich factors — the common analysis for determining whether a product design or feature can be owned as a trademark or whether it is functional and part of the public

LazarusIt’s the end of March which can mean only one thing:  March Madness!  For many sports fans, this is easily the “most wonderful time of the year” –Christmas, Halloween, New Year’s, Thanksgiving, Fourth of July–all rolled into one.  There’s drama that doesn’t involve an intoxicated relative, excitement superior to detonating small, legal explosives, and gratefulness

Following a nice evening out chatting with Kevin O’Keefe, it’s time for my favorite weekend of all – the NCAA tournament.

Now this post isn’t necessarily about basketball, but rather rivalries. In particular, rivalries between the state of Michigan and the state of North Carolina. Michigan v Duke, Michigan State v. North Carolina…there’s plenty

-Wes Anderson, Attorney

For every serious-minded, informative website out there (I submit for your consideration this august blog) there are countless others that lean more towards the absurd. The website “walmart.horse” is squarely in the latter column. But can something so lighthearted also constitute trademark infringement?

According to Ars Technica, a cartoonist