This story tickles my funny bone. A 16 year old student, Jimmy Winkelmann, started a company called The South Butt, producing a clothing line that was...
Color Trademarks: color as a competitive edge
The food and beverage industry has successfully exploited to its advantage the area of non-traditional marks. Color has been an extremely effective br...
Implications of the AIA: Getting Ready for March 16, 2013
There is so much talk about the significant changes to US patent law from the America Invents Act, especially the controversial changes that go into e...
Defensive strategies – blocking competitors’ patent efforts
The America Invents Act (AIA) now allows third parties to participate in patent prosecution by submitting prior art to the Examiner within nine months...
Prior art defined before and after March 16, 2013
Much of the AIA is now in effect. However, the most controversial changes in patent law won’t come into play until March 16, 2013. These include the...
The intersection of PCT and AIA: important changes in 2012
The America Invents Act significantly changes US patent law and has been a major topic of discussion in the patent community for months. There is one ...
Reclaiming your copyright rights
There is a lot of talk about copyright termination rights of late, as the earliest opportunity for post-1978 copyright grants is coming up in 2013. Br...
Leaving your IP legacy: to whom will you pass down your intellectual property?
An often forgotten issue during estate planning is that copyrights (as well as patents and trademarks) are personal property. As such, they get passed...
Racing to the patent office
The AIA has started a race to the patent office. This will be especially true for technologies where several inventors, research teams or companies ...
Pre-patent disclosure of your invention
There are many times that you need to disclose information about your inventive concept to third parties such as vendors, contractors and investors. T...