Prohibition of “Immoral or Scandalous” Marks Struck Down
Iancu v. Brunetti, 586 U.S.
___ (2019)
The United States Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional the provision of Section 2(a) of the U.S.More
Canada: New Trademark Regime
The long-awaited new Canadian trademark regime came into force on June 17, 2019. In its final form, the most significant changes include the following:
Registration
- classification of goods and services based on the Nice Classification;
- a per-class fee structure
Supreme Court: Copyright Registration Prerequisite to Civil Infringement Action
Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corporation v. Wall-Street.Com, LLC, No. 17-571, 586 U.S. ____ (2019)
In its unanimous March 4, 2019 opinion, the United States Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in holding that copyright owners must wait for the U.S.More
Supreme Court: Meaning of “Full Costs” in Section 505 of the Copyright Act Clarified
Rimini
Street, Inc. v. Oracle USA, Inc., 139 S.Ct. 873 (2019)
Section 505 of the
Copyright Act permits a court to award “full costs.” The general federal statute governing awards
of costs specifies six categories of litigation expenses that qualify as
“costs:” More
Supreme Court: Bankrupt Trademark Licensor Cannot Terminate Trademark License
Eastern District of Texas: Unregistered Trade Dress for Wedding Venue Likely to Prevail in Infringement Action
Sparrow
Barns & Events LLC v. The Ruth Farm Inc., No. 4:19-CV-00067 (E.D. Tex. Apr. 10,
2019)
A district court in
Texas recently granted a preliminary injunction in a case involving
unregistered trade dress rights for a popular wedding venue. More
USPTO: Updates to Approved Identifications of Goods and Services
The USPTO periodically updates its database of approved
identifications of goods and services. https://idm-tmng.uspto.gov/id-master-list-public.html.
These changes often are made to conform
to updates in the international Nice Classification system. Another source of changes is user suggestions
to add identifications for types of goods/services or goods/services which are
not well-covered in the existing USPTO Manual of Acceptable Identifications.More
Australia: Non-Use Period Reduced
Australia’s Intellectual
Property Laws Amendment (Productivity Commission Response Part 1 and Other
Measures) Act 2018 (Amendment Act) took effect on February 24, 2019. The key change is a reduction in the time
period before a trademark registration can be challenged for non-use.
Before the Amendment Act,More
Brazil: New Conditions for Registration of Geographical Indications
The Brazil Patent and
Trademark Office outlined new conditions for the registration of Geographical
Indications by way of its Normative Instruction 095/2018, published on December
28, 2018 and entered into force on February 26, 2019.
Geographical indications
(GIs), which can be protected as intellectual property rights,More
European Union: New Copyright Directive
On April 15, 2019, final
approval was granted by both the European Parliament and the Council of the
European Union to The European Union Directive on Copyright in the Digital
Single Market (the “Directive”), giving EU member states two years to codify
the new Directive into their own national laws. More