Call 855-808-4530 or email [email protected] to receive your discount on a new subscription.
Trademark fair use under the common law and '33(b)(4) of the Lanham Act has long permitted a defendant to use terms descriptively to refer to the defendant's own product or service; in contrast, the doctrine of nominative fair use permits a defendant to use a plaintiff's mark to describe the plaintiff's product or service. Unlike the common law and statutory fair use defense, the nominative fair use doctrine is a judicially created defense of relatively recent vintage. Prior to the development of the nominative fair use defense, courts occasionally declined to enjoin the copying of nondescriptive marks used to refer to the plaintiff's products or services, however, a true doctrinal basis for that result was not expressly articulated until New Kids on the Block v. News America Publishing, Inc., 971 F.2d 302 (9th Cir. 1992).
In that decision, USA Today and The Star independently conducted polls of their readers in connection with a news story about the popular boy-band NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK. The survey, which referred to the NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK, asked readers to call a 900 number to vote and express their opinions about which “New Kid” was the most popular or the sexiest. The group, which ran their own 900 numbers for fans, sued the papers for, among other things, trademark infringement based on their unauthorized commercial use of the group's trademark NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK. Judge Alex Kozinski, writing for the court, explained that the papers' use of the mark could best be understood as involving nontrademark use of a mark:
ENJOY UNLIMITED ACCESS TO THE SINGLE SOURCE OF OBJECTIVE LEGAL ANALYSIS, PRACTICAL INSIGHTS, AND NEWS IN ENTERTAINMENT LAW.
Already a have an account? Sign In Now Log In Now
For enterprise-wide or corporate acess, please contact Customer Service at [email protected] or 877-256-2473
There is no efficient market for the sale of bankruptcy assets. Inefficient markets yield a transactional drag, potentially dampening the ability of debtors and trustees to maximize value for creditors. This article identifies ways in which investors may more easily discover bankruptcy asset sales.
A federal district court in Miami, FL, has ruled that former National Basketball Association star Shaquille O'Neal will have to face a lawsuit over his promotion of unregistered securities in the form of cryptocurrency tokens and that he was a "seller" of these unregistered securities.
Why is it that those who are best skilled at advocating for others are ill-equipped at advocating for their own skills and what to do about it?
Blockchain domain names offer decentralized alternatives to traditional DNS-based domain names, promising enhanced security, privacy and censorship resistance. However, these benefits come with significant challenges, particularly for brand owners seeking to protect their trademarks in these new digital spaces.
In recent years, there has been a growing number of dry cleaners claiming to be "organic," "green," or "eco-friendly." While that may be true with respect to some, many dry cleaners continue to use a cleaning method involving the use of a solvent called perchloroethylene, commonly known as perc. And, there seems to be an increasing number of lawsuits stemming from environmental problems associated with historic dry cleaning operations utilizing this chemical.