A company named Q-Med purchased what turned out to be a counterfeit ETHICON surgical mesh (a wire mesh implanted into the body to strengthen injured muscle wall). At least 15 patients have the counterfeit mesh implanted in their bodies. The FDA doubts whether the fake mesh is even sterile. Story here.
Side-by-side comparison supplied
Chinese anti-counterfeiting officials conducted raids in Shanghai seizing $3 million worth of counterfeit golf clubs bearing brands such as TITLEIST, COBRA and CALLAWAY. Via PGA.COM.
Tim Berners-Lee, one of the founding fathers of the World Wide Web, has written a short essay entitled “New Top Level Domains Considered Harmful” which argues that, uh, they are. He singles out .MOBI for criticism.
Some have weighed in already on this essay, here.
Information Holdings Inc. is the parent company of such IP-service companies as TRADEMARK.COM, MICROPATENT, AURIGIN and MASTER DATA. According to printed reports in the Wall Street Journal, it may be putting itself up for sale. Thomson, parent of T&T, was identified as a potential bidder.
Professor Mark Lemley has written an article entitled : Ex Ante Versus Ex Post Justifications for Intellectual Property
From the abstract (article available here):
The traditional theory of IP is that the prospect of future reward provides an ex ante incentive to innovate. An increasingly common justification for longer and more powerful IP rights
Someone other than the ‘real’ Omarosa (that is to say the Omarosa from that TV show) filed a trademark application for OMAROSA. Via The Smoking Gun.
A year from now that application should be as valuable as those applications for SHOCK AND AWE.
McDonalds prevails over application for MCDATES, which sought to combine serious dating with restaurant dining. TTAB rejects application as users might assume MCDATES was source of fast and cheap dating. Not a close case – applicant used McD’s colors on its website. Thanks to John for the link.
Some marks that constitute McDonalds’ famous MC formative family
Geico sues Google and Overture over keyword sales. Via News.com.
Google Geico here. At the time I did this, at least one of the ads appeared to violate Google’s keyword policy (and didn’t appear to represent fair use). The ad, for a multi-underwriter broker, ran a headline that read, in its entirety, GEICO
ICANN gets antitrust claim dismissed, federal jurisdiction lost, etc.
ICANN budget here.
LexText’s rejoinder to Verisign’s spokesman’s comment that the loss was ‘not that unexpected’: ‘Yeah, that’s it, we meant to lose.’
South African tobacco exec convicted of counterfeiting PETER STUYVESANT cigarettes, via SABC News.