TRADE MARK LAW IN USA Trademark is a word, symbol or phrase used for identifying a particular manufactures or seller’s products and distinguish them from other products. The overall purpose of Trademark law is to prevent unfair trade competitions by protecting the use of words, symbols logo design, name ect..Why because these are the key distinguishing things of goods and services of a firm. These laws protecting consumers by preventing firms and companies from using trademarks substantially similar to those of others. The main purpose of these laws is to avoid confusions regarding the identity and quality of companies and preventing the companies from diluting the marks of other’s. In present day world particularly in commercial market, …show more content…
The usual injunction is to halt production and sale of infringing goods and services. In some cases the courts might order an injunction for corrective advertising, which forces the defendant to pay for an amount of advertising necessary to reverse the damage to the plaintiff’s mark. DAMAGES:-a court may award damages for trademark infringement reflecting some combination of the factors like
1. Defendant’s profit (Plaintiff is required only to prove the amount of defendant's sales. The burden then shifts to defendant to prove up its costs and expenses to be deducted from the total sales amount to give the amount of defendant's profits. If the court finds the recovery amount based on defendant's profits is inadequate or excessive, the court may enter judgment a sum it believes is just in light of the "circumstances of the case.")
2. Damages sustained by the plaintiff (Plaintiff must prove up its actual damages. The court bases its determination of damages on the actual amount of damages plaintiff's has proven or any sum above that amount but not more than three times above the actual damage amount.)
3. Cost of bringing the law suit (may include attorney’s
Damages in the United States include two categories. Compensatory damages are intended to compensate for the plaintiff’s loss. Punitive damages, on the contrary, are meant to punish the defendant .The punitive damages exceed the plaintiff’s loss, to dissuade the defendant from any further wrongdoings. For instance, having a company pay significant punitive damages may encourage it to greater caution. Another difference between the two categories is the money involved. If the damages are compensatory, the money usually goes entirely to the plaintiff, but if they are punitive, part of the money goes to the law firm and part to the plaintiff.
If a breach of contract is both material and opportunistic, the injured promisee has a claim in restitution to the profit realized by the defaulting promisor as a result of the breach. Liability in restitution with disgorgement of profit is an alternative to liability for contract damages measured by injury to the promisee.
The definition of trademark infringement is a violation of the exclusive rights attaching to a trademark without the authorization of the trademark owner. The three elements of a trademark infringement claim are 1.) An unauthorized use, 2.) A protectable property interest that creates and 3.) A likelihood of confusion among consumers as to the source or origin of the goods or service. The two cases we discussed in class for trademark infringement were the Indianapolis Colts case and Dodgers Sports Bar case. In the Indianapolis Colts case the NFL permitted the “Baltimore Colts” to move to Indianapolis and the team was renamed the “Indianapolis Colts”. Nine years later the CFL granted a franchise to a Baltimore team. They named the team the “Baltimore Colts” and the NFL threatened to sue. The CFL Baltimore team changed their name to the “Baltimore CFL Colts”. After this happened the “Indianapolis Colts” sued the new CFL team in Federal Court for trademark infringement based on misappropriation and consumer confusion. This case was based off of likelihood of confusion among consumers because if a fan were to want to buy Colts gear they would think these teams are the same thing and would eventually figure out that they weren’t the same team. The second case we discussed in class was the Dodgers Sports Bar case. In this case the Los Angeles Dodgers sued a bar in Los Angeles for naming the sports bar “The Brooklyn Dodgers Sports Bar”. They sued them because they had “Dodgers” in the name of their sports bar. The name Dodgers belonged to the Los Angeles Dodgers and was not allowed to be used anywhere else in association with sports. This sports bar sold burgers and hot dogs and everything you normally can get at a baseball...
In every given business, the name itself portrays different meanings. This serves as the reference point and sometimes the basis of customers on what to expect within the company. Since personality affects product image (Langmeyer & Shank, 1994), the presence of brand helps in the realization of this concept. Traditionally, brand is a symbolic manifestation of all the information connected with a company, product, or service (Nilson, 2003; Olin, 2003). A brand is typically composed of a name, logo, and other visual elements such as images, colors, and icons (Gillooley & Varley, 2001; Laforet & Saunders, 1994)). It is believed that a brand puts an impression to the consumer on what to expect to the product or service being offered (Mere, 1995). In other application, brand may be referred as trademark, which is legally appropriate term. The brand is the most powerful weapon in the market (LePla & Parker, 1999). Brands possess personality in which people associate their experience. Oftentimes, they are related to the core values the company executes.
In the absence of registered trade mark rights, case law suggests as a general principle, that mere similarity of goods is not enough for an actionable wrong to occur. Passing off derives from the common law action deceit which is the civil action for fraudulent misrepresentation. Passing off is a non-statutory cause of action that has developed over the years through case law and has changed considerably overtime. Passing off came into existence long before trademarks became registerable and has always been available at common law for marks refused registration, not registered or ineligible for
One element is duty that the defendant owed legal duty to a plaintiff and the defendant did not follow through with the agreed duty, The next element is known as breach of duty which is when a defendant does something or doesn’t do something that they said they were going to do. The third element is called causation which means a plaintiff must prove a defendant’s negligence caused him or her injury. The fourth element to proving negligence is damages which requires the court or defendant to compensate the plaintiff for his or injuries. These are all the ways to prove negligence in a case between a defendant and
It is for the judge to decide if the case meets two criteria: there must have been a wrongful act committed and the plaintiff must have suffered.
and remedies applied by courts of law in civil proceedings giving the plaintiff or claimant relief
Intellectual Property - Intellectual property reflects on the ideas and things we can imagine and produce with our minds. Intellectual property includes anything that may be patented, owned, or protected by a trademark. There are four types of intellectual property, such as trademark, copyrights, patents, and trade secrets. Based on this week’s scenario, Sam had signed a non-disclosure agreement as a condition of his employment with ABC but unfortunately, has violated the conditions by downloading a list of customers for the company. This implies that the subject of intellectual property
Where compensation takes the form of a monetary award, it adequately satisfies the plaintiff for any financial harm caused . For example...
Damages – if the other party cause’s drastic damages that cost the other party or affect it negatively than the other party can sue and take them to court of law, and the court may claim that the affected party may be paid and be taken back to its original position as it was
The plaintiff must prove that the defendant had a duty to act reasonably, that the defendant failed to fulfill that obligation, that the breach of duty caused the plaintiffs injuries, and that the plaintiff suffered some sort of injury. In order to prove that the defendant was negligent and therefore liable for their injuries, the plaintiff must prove all of the elements which are duty, breach, proximate cause, and damages. For instance, one of the elements is damages, meaning the plaintiff must have suffered damages (injuries, loss, etc.) in order for the defendant to be held liable. So even if you can prove that the defendant indeed acted negligently, you may not collect damages if you didn't suffer any injuries. The law will not hold a defendant liable for every injury to the plaintiff but only for those injuries that are proven and directly related to a breach of a
The defendant is an Airlines Company that had 900 employees. The economic crisis followed with monetary crisis gave bad effects to the defendant. They should decrease the number of their airplanes form 9 to 2 airplanes. They also had to do the efficiency on their employees to 700. On the efficiency process, there was an agreement between the defendant and employees representation on October 30 1998. The agreement stated that they would bring Independent Public Accountant to analyze company financial condition. During the process, all side should work on their duty. The Defendant should pay employees’ wage. The agreement was not guarantee that didn’t mean the dispute process was over, but the negotiation still moved on. During the process, there was another agreement between the defendant and several employees. They agreed the finish the disputed process and the employees would get separation pay. Meanwhile, other employees, who were 153 people didn’t agree with that agreement. Because they didn’t agree each other, so the employees gave the case to the “Panitia Penyelesaian Perselisihan Perburuhan Pusat (P4P)”.
A brand identifies a seller’s product from a competitor’s product. There are three main purposes for branding product identification, which is the most important purpose, repeat sales, and new-product sales. Branding has a lot of terms that marketers use there is brand equity, global brand, and brand loyalty. Marketers also have different brand strategies that they use for different products or customers. It all depends on the consumer for them to decide which strategy they will use. The different strategies are generic products, manufacturer’s brands, private brands, individual brands, family brands, and co-branding. The branding purposes and the branding strategy make up the importance of branding.
Every company seeks to create its own brand - a unique and effective image. Purpose of brand is attracting and retaining customers in its market share. Branding in marketing is a complex technology, aimed at making advantageous position a brand from the competition. Facilitating the search for the necessary goods to the buyer, branding in marketing becomes more effective if the consumer product features meet market requirements. It is especially necessary to identify the goods, for a case of unprepared buyer which can not assess the competitive characteristics (for example, high-tech products). The development of technology has had a huge impact on human society. It is reflected in the fact that we are surrounded by complex technical devices that we use every day and sometimes we have no idea of how this thing is located within. Here the brand comes to help the consumer that stands out from all those product characteristics that are important to the consumer and facilitates the understanding of the product.