Heitner Legal
Have you tried to register a trademark or contemplated filing a trademark application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office only to find that someone else has already registered an identical or similar trademark? This is a common problem for people in the United States, where trademark rights are generally provided to whoever was first […]
On January 21, 2021, The Topps Company, Inc. tweeted, “We captured the Presidential Inauguration action #ToppsNOW style!” with a link to a “full slate” of new cards featuring various prominent celebrities and politicians who took part in the inauguration of President Joe Biden. The most popular card was and undoubtedly will be one of Bernie […]
A defendant can only be liable for trademark infringement if a third party’s owned trademark registration is used in a trademark way. Stated in another way, the defendant’s use needs to be one where the mark is identifying the source of the good or service. The creator of a well-known chocolate nut pie learned that […]
On January 6, 2021, a high school athlete, Ethan Elalou, appealed a final judgment from the Circuit Court for the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit of Broward County in favor of the School Board of Broward County on an executed pre-game release waiver form that barred his claim of negligence against the school board. On appeal, Elalou […]
Under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA), 15 U.S.C. § 1125(d), a defendant is liable for cybersquatting if it registers, traffics in, or uses a domain name that is confusingly similar to a third party’s trademark with “bad faith intent to profit from that mark.” A successful claim under the ACPA requires that three elements be […]
The Copyright Act allows the owner of an infringed copyright to recover statutory damages, when there is an innocent infringement, in a sum of between $750 and $30,000. When the infringement is willful, the statutory damages can reach as high as $150,000 per infringement. The Lanham Act allows the owner of an infringed trademark registration […]
Have you received a demand letter from the Law Firm of Higbee & Associates? If so, then you are not alone. We have been forwarded numerous emails and other written correspondence from the Law Firm of Higbee & Associates, demanding a large sum of money in exchange for a release of claims related to allegations of […]
We have recently gone over the test for attorney’s fees in copyright infringement cases. As a refresher, under 17 U.S. Code § 505 the prevailing party in a copyright infringement case may be entitled to an award of its reasonable attorney’s fees, and the court will look at relevant factors such as: (1) whether the claim was frivolous; (2) the party’s motivation; […]
A trademark applicant earns a mulligan on its application to register a golf-related mark. The ex-parte appeal was brought by Driven Golf, Inc., which had originally suffered a defeat when the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office examining attorney assigned to its application determined there to be a likelihood of confusion with another mark that was […]
The natural zone of expansion doctrine is a special rule that can apply in the realm of trademark law. It comes up from time-to-time when two parties have separate claims of priority within a class of goods and services. When an individual or corporate entity files a trademark application, the application must specify the categories […]