Trademarks

Morning Docket: 10.31.11

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Taylor Swift

* Snowtober was a treat for some, but a trick for many more. Let us know how your firm is handling this Halloween horror. Email us or send a text to (646) 820-TIPS. [Reuters]

* Will the legal profession continue to be a slave to ethical rules of the past? Only if lawyers can’t profit from it. And if they can, then say hello to an ABA resolution in 2012. [New York Times]

* Pot trafficker: add this one to the list of career alternatives for attorneys that aren’t working out so well. But if you don’t mind giving up your Benz and getting disbarred, then go for it. [Times Union]

* Yo Taylor, I’m really happy for you, I’mma let you finish, but Beyoncé had one of the best topless trademark lawsuits of all time. One of the best topless trademark lawsuits of all time! [Daily Mail]

* Urine trouble, lady. Here’s some proof that next time things aren’t going your way in court, you should try peeing all over yourself. [New York Post]

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Whoops, the San Francisco Giants Forgot to Trademark Their Logo

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Nobody ever seems to believe me when I say this, but San Francisco gets chilly. It is cold most of the time. And foggy. The warmest time of year is right now, in late October. If you come to visit in July, and you stay in the city, and you will get cold.

That’s why every San Francisco tourist ever buys those cheesy sweatshirts with “San Francisco” written on them in a font that strangely resembles one of the main logos for our hugely disappointing championship-winning major-league baseball team, the Giants. Actually, it might be exactly the same logo. The baseball team is currently in a trademark dispute with the clothing company from Hayward (Oakland’s smaller, crappier neighbor to the south) over rights to the logo.

But hold on, the Giants have been using it for almost 20 years. They must have gotten the rights locked down years ago, right? Oopsies….

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Morning Docket: 10.17.11

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* Wait, is this real? People actually sued al-Qaeda and expect to be paid billions of dollars in damages? Seriously? Having a major “what is this I don’t even” moment over here. [Bloomberg]

* Judith Kaye is the new centerfold for the New York State Court of Appeals. She’s the first woman in history whose portrait will hang in the state’s highest courtroom. [New York Law Journal]

* Thompson Hine partner Leslie Jacobs was charged with tax fraud last week. As could be expected, the Biglaw firm now wants nothing to do with him. [Am Law Daily]

* Another law firm’s confidential files mysteriously ended up in the garbage, but this time at a Georgia newspaper’s office. Just as an FYI, our office is located in New York. [Gainesville Times]

* GTL doesn’t just stand for “Gym, Tan, Laundry” anymore. Apparently, it also stands for “Get The Lawyer.” The Situation is suing a guido lifestyle company for trademark infringement. [Examiner]

* Lindsay Lohan’s alleged probation violations might send her back to the slammer, but she doesn’t want to be made “an example of” in court. Sweetie, it’s called “a mockery.” [Daily Mail]

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Morning Docket: 09.22.11

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* It took SCOTUS more than four hours to write one sentence. But oh, to be a fly on the wall last night when they decided to deny a stay of execution for Troy Davis. [New York Times]

* AT&T wants to take the DOJ’s antitrust case to trial. This must be some sort of a joke, but the only punchline I can think of is the company’s crappy wireless network. [Bloomberg]

* Court-clogger or pocket-stuffer: Andrew Cuomo is debating signing a bill that could put more money into the hands of class action attorneys. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]

* GW Law ex-adjunct Richard Lieberman was disbarred this week. What is with all of these lawyers who try to seduce minors online? Such a weird casualty of this profession. [National Law Journal]

* Because Chanel No. 399 just doesn’t sound as classy as Chanel No. 5, the company has filed a massive trademark infringement lawsuit against nearly 400 defendants. [ABC News]

* Memo to our readers: You know our exploding car thing was just a caption contest, right? We weren’t anticipating a real life lawyer car bombing. [Forbes]

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Non-Sequiturs: 09.02.11

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Judge Ginsburg: back to school.

* Judge Douglas Ginsburg (D.C. Cir.) is taking senior status and joining the NYU Law faculty. Query how this will affect his feeding (and no, we’re not talking about New York versus D.C. restaurants). [The BLT: The Blog of Legal Times]

* “Two Examples of Things Not to Say When You’re at Your Local IRS Office.” [Going Concern]

* Speaking of efficiency-challenged government entities, how can the U.S. postal service be fixed? Professor Gerard Magliocca floats some ideas. [Concurring Opinions]

Madonna: going to court.

* Should you rinse religion from your résumé? Reflections from Professor Paul Horwitz. [PrawfsBlawg]

* The Material Girl is going to trial — over the trademark to “Material Girl.” [Fashionista]

* It’s not just law schools that are getting sued for fraud; it’s happening to art schools too. [PetaPixel]

* Elsewhere in litigation land, Quinn Emanuel is making bank — by suing banks. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]

* What’s the deal with high-frequency trading algorithms? Fear not; the SEC is on the case. [Dealbreaker]

31 Comments

Morning Docket: 08.30.11

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Stacey Blitsch: Would you jilt this lover?

* Alabama “welcomes visitors,” but reserves the right to question their papers. The state won’t get the chance to show visitors this kind of southern hospitality any time soon thanks to an injunction. [CNN]

* Someone in the Facebook marketing department must have realized that there’s no publicity like free publicity, because the company’s trademark battle with parody site Lamebook is over. [The Recorder]

* Guys at my high school used to sext nasty pictures to 13-year-old girls all the time, it was no big deal. It’s only a big deal when one of the guys is the high school’s assistant football coach. [Los Angeles Times]

* Next time you have a property dispute, talk to Charles Saulson. He doesn’t take sh*t from anyone, he just throws it. Allegedly. [New York Magazine]

* I wasn’t a fan of that Red light/Green light game when I was a kid, and this attorney probably wasn’t, either. He’s representing victims of red light camera injustice for free. [WSJ Law Blog]

* “You shouldn’t be able to go around ruining people’s lives because you’re a jilted lover.” This lawyerly Lothario must not have much experience with women. [New York Post]

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Non-Sequiturs: 08.24.11

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Neal Katyal

* “Dominique Strauss-Kahn Gets Off, As Did Everyone Else Who Stayed In His Room At The Sofitel.” Or: what you don’t want to know about your high-end hotel room. [Dealbreaker]

* F**k yeah — trademark law! Or: some reflections on the “immoral or scandalous” bar to trademark registration, by fashion lawyer Chuck Colman. [Law of Fashion]

* The New Jersey Supreme Court just issued a major new decision calling for changes in the way that courts handle eyewitness identifications — an issue that will also be going before SCOTUS in the coming Term. [The Innocence Project]

* Congratulations to Professor Neal Katyal, former acting U.S. solicitor general, who’s apparently headed to Hogan Lovells. [Am Law Daily]

* Professor Orin Kerr is not impressed by how Dean Linda Ammons has handled the controversy over Professor Larry Connell. [Volokh Conspiracy via Instapundit]

* They have lots of lawyers over at the IRS (former workplace of Michele Bachmann). Do you really expect them to be good at math? [Going Concern]

* Does signing a bill into law with an autopen present constitutional problems? Professor Terry Turnipseed explains how it might. [Slate]

* Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain thinks that President Obama’s decision not to defend DOMA constitutes an “impeachable defense.” [Poliglot / Metro Weekly]

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Morning Docket: 08.24.11

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* A law firm in England, Edwards Duthie, believes that everyone is entitled to legal representation, even those who don’t believe in the rule of law. Have fun with Gaddafi; he should be a model client. [Guardian]

* An appeals court has ruled that Casey Anthony must serve her probation in Florida. It’s time for Extreme Makeover: Acquitted-of-Baby-Killing Edition. Casey would look good as a blonde. [CNN]

* Now that we know that a software program can practice law, with this settlement, is it fair to say that LegalZoom was only kinda illegally practicing law in Missouri? [WSJ Law Blog]

* Football players are suing over concussions. If the helmet on your head wasn’t warning enough that you could get a brain injury from playing the game, then I don’t know what to tell you. [Fox News]

* Don’t mess with Texas, unless you want to get hit with a trademark infringement lawsuit. I guess romance novels aren’t considered trash these days. [Austin Business Journal]

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The ‘Redneck Olympics’ Try to Jump the Hurdle of Law

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Over the weekend, a quaint little festival took place up in Hebron, Maine: the Redneck Olympics. Don’t ask me why this event happened in Maine. I didn’t think that rednecks were allowed to cross the Mason-Dixon line. The event featured typical redneck fare, including a greased watermelon haul, a wife-carrying race, toilet seat horseshoes, and bobbing for pig’s feet. Needless to say, it was a hit.

So naturally, when I heard that a lawsuit was brewing over Maine’s summer games, I wondered what could have happened. Was someone injured during a Dukes of Hazard-style car jump competition? Did someone get whiplash after one too many bucks on the mechanical bull? Was there an abundance of alcohol poisoning after the PBR case race?

But none of these things happened. No arrests were made, and the lone injury was a bee sting. So why is the organizer of the Redneck Olympics facing a lawsuit? Let the games begin, y’all….

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Morning Docket: 08.02.11

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* The DOJ is suing Alabama because of its immigration law, saying it interferes with federal law. To the extent that federal law won’t prosecute illegal aliens, they’re spot on. [Bloomberg]

* Floridians, grab your pitchforks, torches, and chloroform, because Casey Anthony has to return to Orlando for a year’s worth of probation on check fraud charges. [CNN]

* Like many a man before him, Charlie Sheen decided to pull out on his extortion lawsuit against porn star Capri Anderson. Winning? You be the judge. [New York Daily News]

* FYI: If a pretty design will make wiping your own ass easier, you probably can’t trademark it. Not even if you waste 675,000 pieces of paper to prove your case. [Mogulite]

* A photographer is suing over the use of her pictures on Project Runway. I bet if Tim Gunn told her to “make it work,” she’d drop it and offer up the rest of her photos on a platter. [Hollywood Reporter]

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