Law Commons^™

Parallel Play: The Simultaneous Professional Responsibility Campaigns Against Unethical Ip Practitioners By The United States And China, Mark A. Cohen

Akron Law Review

“Parallel Play: The Simultaneous Professional Responsibility Campaigns Against IP Practitioners by the United States and China” describes efforts by the United States Patent and Trademark Office and the China National IP Administration to discipline trademark and patent practitioners through contemporaneous campaign-style approach directed to bad faith filings. At the USPTO, many of these bad faith filings have originated from China. In both countries, these bad faith activities have imposed significant burdens on IP agencies, the courts, and legitimate rights holders. The campaign is likely the largest professional responsibility campaign undertaken by an IP agency, and the largest cross-border IP disciplinary …

Under Nifty Light: Trademark Considerations For The New Digital World, Willajeanne F. Mclean

Akron Law Review

Three cases involving non-fungible tokens are grabbing the attention of fashionistas, intellectual property mavens, and metaverse cognoscenti alike. All three are cases of first impression, despite involving trademark infringement claims. All are considered to be cases that will determine whether old trademark principles apply to new technology, and each has compelling and competing arguments that may militate against findings of infringement. While most commentators have focused on the questions surrounding alleged infringement, very few have discussed the challenges of applying remedies, such as injunctions, traditionally used in trademark infringement cases.

This article considers trademark law and examines it in a …

Revisiting The Justification Of Trademark Protection For Single Drug Compositions: A Critical Analysis From A Regulatory Perspective, Kuhu Tiwari, Dr. Niharika Sahoo Bhattacharya

Akron Law Review

Trademarks, which are premised on product differentiation, are alleged to play a divergent role when used on pharmaceutical products: they tend to create an artificial product differentiation for the bioequivalent pharmaceutical products that are marketed as branded, generics, and branded-generic products. It is implied that the companies incorporate trademarks to market their products to different consumers at different prices. However, concerns arise when a company uses multiple trademarks for a single active pharmaceutical ingredient (API); sometimes, the company labels each trademark as treating a different medical condition.

This practice of brand proliferation may pose risks to patient safety by confusing …

A Masterclass In Trademark's Descriptive Fair Use Defense, Deborah R. Gerhardt

Akron Law Review

When judges decide trademark cases, they often must balance trademark rights against interests in free expression. The defense known as “classic” or “descriptive” fair use embraces the foundational themes that make trademark conflicts so compelling. By design, the defense pits fair competition and free speech against a mark owner’s right to control its story, reputation, and values. The outcome of this tug of war may be hard to predict. It turns on consumer perception, and therefore, generally raises questions of fact. But in Mars, Inc. v. J.M. Smucker Co., this fact intensive question was decided as a matter of law. …

Harmonizing Cultural Ip Across Borders: Fashionable Bags & Ghanaian Adinkra Symbols, J. Janewa Osei-Tutu

Akron Law Review

Global copyright and trademark laws protect symbols, names, and literary and artistic works. However, when their primary significance is cultural, because they are neither individual original works nor symbols that are used as commercial identifiers, intellectual property laws do not protect these symbols or artistic works. This is true, even if these goods are protected under national laws as part of that nation’s cultural heritage. Once these cultural goods cross borders, there is no international law that will enable the country from which these goods originate to assert its rights in other countries. This Article characterizes these cultural goods as …

Criminal Trademark Enforcement And The Problem Of Inevitable Creep, Mark P. Mckenna

Akron Law Review

This Article focuses on the federal Trademark Counterfeiting Act (TCA), the primary source of federal criminal trademark sanctions. That statute was intended to increase the penalties associated with the most egregious form of trademark infringement—use of an identical mark for goods identical to those for which the mark is registered and in a context in which the use is likely to deceive consumers about the actual source of the counterfeiter’s goods. The TCA was intended to ratchet up the penalties associated with counterfeiting, but only in cases involving particularly egregious conduct.

Several recent trends in the application of the TCA, …

Trademark Boundaries And 3d Printing, Lucas S. Osborn

Akron Law Review

3D printing technology promises to disrupt trademark law at the same time that trademark law and policy sustain repeated criticism. The controversial growth of trademark law over the last century has yielded amorphous sponsorship and affiliation confusion issues and empirically fragile post-sale and initial-interest confusion theories, among others. Into this melee marches 3D printing technology, which dissociates the process of design from that of manufacturing and democratizes manufacturing. Rather than being embodied only in physical objects, design is embodied in digital CAD files that users can post and sell on the internet. The digitization of physical objects raises fundamental questions …

Charitable Trademarks, Leah Chan Grinvald

Akron Law Review

Charity is big business in the United States. In 2015, private individuals or entities donated over $350 billion, which accounted for approximately two percent of the gross domestic product in the United States. Even though this seems like big money, these donations were split among over 1.5 million organizations. And each year, the number of charitable organizations grows and therefore, the competition for public donations increases. In part to succeed in such competition, some charitable organizations have turned to branding and trademarks as a way to differentiate their entities and to encourage donations. Drawing from the for-profit branding and trademarking …

Andy Warhol's Pantry, Brian L. Frye

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

This Article examines Andy Warhol’s use of food and food products as a metaphor for commerce and consumption. It observes that Warhol’s use of images and marks was often inconsistent with copyright and trademark doctrine, and suggests that the fair use doctrine should incorporate a “Warhol test.”

Food Patents: The Unintended Consequences, Jay Dratler Jr.

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

This short paper explores the unintended consequences of this strong economic incentive. The underlying assumptions of patent law and its economic incentive are that innovation is good, and newer is better. But is that always so? Science and history suggest maybe not, for some very fundamental reasons. And there are reasons to believe that the risks of unintended consequences of innovation in food may be more hazardous than those in other fields of innovation.

Internationalization And Local Elements: Research On Recent Amendments To The Trademark Law Of China, Xiaoqing Feng

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

This article will explore varying aspects of the amendments of the Chinese Trademark Law. Part Two deals with detailed analysis and the reasons for the third amendment of the Trademark Law; this part is composed of five sections. The first section discusses the perfection of the application system for trademark registration, including the increase of the number of elements eligible for trademark registration, the implementation of “one trademark for multi categories,” the improvement of the system of opposition, the introduction of a proposal review system, and the availability for submitting electronic applications. The second section discusses (1) the improvement of …

Ip And Health Care: New Drugs Pricing And Medical Mistakes, Jay Dratler Jr.

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

I propose to address briefly two important IP questions from an economic perspective: patented drug pricing in an international context and trade secret protection for health care outcomes. The first will involve some algebra; the second involves a bit of common sense that so far seems to have eluded us.

Trademarks In 2010 (And 2011): Dilution Takes Center Stage, David S. Welkowitz

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

From the hundreds of trademark cases decided in any year, it is often difficult to discern any particular theme. There are cases from many different areas raising very disparate issues. In 2010, however, trademark dilution stands out as the area with the most prominent doctrinal opinions. In addition to three court of appeals decisions, there were five significant Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (“TTAB”) decisions from an entity whose prior involvement in dilution had been very much the exception. These dilution opinions form the centerpiece of this discussion.

There were, of course, other notable decisions involving contributory infringement and the …

The Ethics Of Deception: Pretext Investigations In Trademark Cases, Phillip Barengolts

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

Pretext investigations of trademark infringement usually implicate one or more of four rules of professional responsibility: truthful communications, communications with adverse parties represented by counsel, communications with parties unrepresented by counsel, and the prohibition of deceptive behavior. There is an additional rule on using paralegals or non-lawyer assistants to do the actual investigation which also comes into play on occasion.

Checks, Balance And Judicial Wizardry: Constitutional Delegation And Congressional Legislation, Robert I. Reis

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

Recent Supreme Court activity regarding "intellectual property" may lead some to believe the increase in cases has some further meaning beyond the decisions themselves. The interests they represent and the source of power to enact legislation in the field raise distinct issues that may inform of current judicial interest and concern. These don't necessarily delineate the constitutional role of the Court relative to the delegation under Article I, Section Eight, Clause 8 of the United States Constitution. A gathering of cases using conventional search resources and techniques yielded 666 patent cases and 73 copyright cases. This essay is not intended …

What Is The Mclaw In Malaysia?, Amy Moscato-Wolter

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

This article will discuss the extent of protection given to McDonald's interest in the prefix "Mc" in the United States as a result of the case McDonald's Corp. v. Druck & Gerner, D.D.S., P.C., d/bla McDental (hereinafter McDental), where it was determined that the "Mc" family of marks can even be protected when affixed to the name of a generic non-food item. Such success, however, has not been matched in other parts of the world. I will also discuss McCurry Restaurant (KL) Sdn Bhd v. McDonalds Corp. (hereinafter McCurry), where a Malaysian court determined that the "Mc" prefix coupled …

Federal Trademark Remedies: A Proposal For Reform, Mark A. Thurmon

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

It is time to take this problem seriously and reform the remedial rules of the Lanham Act. This article presents a specific proposal for reform that includes the following key changes:

• statutory damages are available as an alternative to actual damages, and this new remedy is available to prevailing trademark owners in all actions under the Lanham Act;
• the defendant's profits remedy is limited to those profits attributable to the infringement, but this remedy is available to prevailing trademark owners in all actions under the Lanham Act (i.e., proof of willful infringement or some other type of bad faith is …

Trademarks And Related Rights: Highlights For 2009-10, David S. Welkowitz

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

However, the most important part of the [Rescuecom Corp. v. Google, Inc.] opinion was not the decision itself, or its reasoning. Rather, it was the Appendix that the court annexed to its opinion that made the decision extraordinary. As law students, we are all taught that federal courts will not issue advisory opinions. But it is difficult to view the Rescuecom Appendix as anything other than an advisory opinion. And its breadth is rather sweeping. The court embarked on a fairly lengthy discussion of the history and purpose of the “use in commerce” definition. It concluded that it …

An Introduction To U.S. Export Control: Regulations For Patent Practitioners, Michael K. Carrier

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

This article presents basic information on the U.S. export control laws most relevant to U.S. patent practice, including the preparation and filing of patent applications related to commercial items, and the intended audience of this article is the U.S. patent practitioner who does not routinely deal with export-controlled subject matter. If the patent practitioner intends to: export technical information from the U.S. for the purpose of having a patent application prepared; hire or work with foreign nationals (who may or may not actually be in the U.S.) in conducting technical research or patentability and invalidity searches; or help prepare patent …

Toward Non-Neutral First Principles Of Private Law: Designing Secondary Liability Rules For New Technological Uses, Thomas C. Folsom

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

A series of recent cases revisits secondary liability in intellectual property law, solving some particular problems but without providing completely specified rules that are predictable and principled. Prior law already includes several varieties of secondary liability with a rationale for each. Together, these old and new sources point the way towards a synthesis, which may allow for a designed solution that is more fully specified, at least in respect of new technological uses. When all is said, secondary liability in intellectual property law still turns on two essential questions: (1) is there someone who is liable for direct infringement, and …

Ip Remedies After Ebay: Assessing The Impact On Trademark Law, Sandra Rierson

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

The Supreme Court's decision in eBay Inc. v. MercExchange, L.L.C. changed the law regarding remedies in patent cases - specifically the "general rule... that a permanent injunction will issue once infringement and validity have been adjudged. Prior to eBay, the Federal Circuit held that injunctive relief was an inappropriate remedy for patent infringement only in a narrow category of cases in which enjoining an infringer would frustrate an important public interest. The Supreme Court rejected that assumption, holding instead that plaintiffs seeking this form of remedy for patent infringement were required to satisfy the traditional, four-factor test for injunctive relief. …

Truth In Intellectual Property Revisited: Embracing Ebay At The Edge, Thomas C. Folsom

Akron Intellectual Property Journal

In addition to whatever else it might do to serve the public interest, intellectual property diminishes the commons. To that extent, any particular intellectual property claim intersects the public interest and affects more than just the immediate parties. Not only does intellectual property diminish the commons, but also each of its disciplines contains an almost casually incoherent metaphysic. There is incoherence, if not at the core, at least at the critical edges of intellectual property law that is systemic and fundamental. Notwithstanding over 200 years of practice in the United States, the goal of establishing a sufficiently principled, practical and …

Gray Market Goods Produced By Foreign Affiliates Of The U.S. Trademark Owner: Should The Lanham Act Provide A Remedy?, Steven M. Auvil

Akron Law Review

I shall argue that, with limited exceptions, the problem posed by genuine gray market imports from an affiliated source is not a trademark problem per se, and as such federal relief must come from Congress in the form of sui generis legislation. First, I shall briefly examine the historical background of this problem and discuss the debate leading up to the K Mart decision. Second, I shall discuss the nature of the trademark right, provisions under the Lanham Act that safeguard that right and several illustrative gray market cases decided thereunder. Third, I shall discuss the relationship between the trademark …

Comment: The Tiger Woods Case - Has The Sixth Circuit Abandoned Trademark Law? Etw Corp. V. Jireh Publishing, Inc., Joseph R. Dreitler

Akron Law Review

For more than fifty years, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit vigilantly protected the intellectual property rights of trademark owners and persons seeking protection of their privacy and rights of publicity. Less than two years ago, that changed. In a turnaround remarkable for its suddenness and completeness, the court veered away from protecting intellectual property rights. Perhaps the reason for the departure lies in the stinging reversals of two of its decisions by the United States Supreme Court, or perhaps it lies in a string of admittedly questionable cases brought by overreaching plaintiffs. Regardless of the …

Initial Impressions: Trademark Protection For Abbreviations Of Generic Or Descriptive Terms, Mary Lafrance

Akron Law Review

This article compares the approaches which different federal courts have adopted to address the distinctiveness of abbreviations where the underlying expression or information conveyed by the abbreviation is unprotectable either because it is generic or because it is descriptive and lacks secondary meaning. While this study is not intended as a comprehensive survey, it is designed to highlight the inconsistencies in approaches. The article concludes with some observations about the patterns and trends emerging from the unsettled decisional law.