Descriptive marks consist of words that are indicative of the characteristics or qualities related to the goods or services associated with the mark. Unlike suggestive marks which require the consumer to use reasoning to understand the mark’s...
trademark law
Digital Millennium Copyright Act
Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), is a federal statute that addresses a number of copyright issues created by the use of new technology and the Internet including digital rights management (methods for stopping infringement), and...
dilution
In law, dilution refers to the use of a mark or trade name in commerce that is sufficiently similar to a famous mark that by association it confuses or diminishes the public's perception of the famous mark. For example, an appliance company...
dilution (trademark)
In law, dilution refers to the use of a trademark or trade name in commerce that is sufficiently similar to a famous mark that by association it confuses or diminishes the public's perception of the famous mark. For example, an appliance...
direct infringement
Direct infringement is the unauthorized exercise of one of the exclusive rights granted to the owner of a patent, copyright or trademark.
In patent law, direct infringement occurs when a person, without authorization, makes...
distinctive trademark
A distinctive trademark is a trademark that “identifies and distinguishes” the relevant goods or services. This is required for a trademark to be eligible for federal trademark protection and registration at the United States and Trademark...
espionage
Espionage is the crime of spying or secretly watching a person, company, government, etc. for the purpose of gathering secret information or detecting wrongdoing, and to transfer such information to another organization or state. The act of...
exclusive license
Exclusive license allows a licensor to share intellectual property with a licensee for a specific period of time that usually binds the licensor to not share the property with anyone else. Normally, the license is unique to a certain area or...
exhaustion
Exhaustion refers to the doctrine that states once a product is sold by a patent owner, the patent owner can’t sue the purchaser for having an authorized copy of the patented product. The patent owner’s exclusive rights of the patented...
fair use
Fair use is a type of affirmative defense in copyright law. Regulated under 17 USC §107, the congress list four factors in deciding if a use of the original work is a fair use. The four factors are: 1) the character and purpose of the use; 2) the...