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Apple Denied Trademark For 'Multi-Touch'

Posted by Soulskill on from the have-to-settle-for-imultitouch dept.

suraj.sun sends this excerpt from MacRumors: "In a decision handed down by the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board at the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), Apple has been denied an application for a trademark on Multi-Touch. ... For trademarks, 'the greater the degree of descriptiveness the term has, the heavier the burden to prove it has attained secondary meaning.' The trademark attorney pointed out that the term 'multitouch' has taken on generic meaning, being used by a wide variety of publications to describe the touchscreen technology on Android phones, tablets, and notebooks."

3 of 217 comments (clear)

  1. There should be some penalties... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    How could Apple try to trademark 'Multi-touch' with a straight face?

    This is like Ford trying to trademark 'Four-wheel drive' or Sony trying to trade mark 'Entertainment Center'.

    Blatantly trying to abuse the system like this should warrant a paddling.

    1. Re:There should be some penalties... by samkass · · Score: 4, Interesting

      It's not as preposterous as it seems, especially considering how long these application processes can take. Before the iPhone, almost no one used the term "multi-touch". Here's Google's trending on the term. [google.com] Note that the iPhone was released in 2007. As the USPTO rightly points out, it is more descriptive than distinctive and has rapidly become a common phrase, so they rightly denied the trademark. But it probably didn't seem as preposterous when the request was originally made.

      --
      E pluribus unum
  2. Re:Now if only... by gman003 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    You know, there's a very simple solution to that:

    Allow people to file amicus curiae-style briefs on any pending patent. Bored Slashdot posters alone would be filing "examples of prior art" for pretty much everything.