Can I get a generic name trademarked? This article (and my knowledge about trademarks) says Generic Names can't be trademarked. So my question is about the genericity of a name and the probability of getting it trademarked. I own a generic domain name with .com since 2010 but lately found that another person is using the .co.uk tld of the same domain since 2016 for a website and doing business. I am planning to develop on my domain. The domain name looks something like freecupcakes.com (just symbolic but not about cupcakes) and another party use the domain freecupcakes.co.uk. my observations about the other person's business are. They are using it since 2016 They don't have trademark registerd but a company with the same name in UK So my questions are,. Can I use proceed building the business with my domain which I own from 2010? Can I register a company with the same name in another location not in UK/Europe? Can this type of name be ever trademarked? Can the other person using the same business name ever trademark this name?
Yes. You can build your business with that. Yes. Also, a trademark is not a trade name and vice versa. This is a common mistake. A trademark is a brand affixed to some kind of product. A trade name is the name of a business. They are not the same things. The fact that you have a business with a particular trade name does not mean that you necessarily have a trademark in that name. You do not necessarily need to have a trademark in your trade name and often you can't because it is not a branding of your product. Probably not. Certainly, you cannot get a principle register trademark for this. You could file a state trademark registration if you sell it in a U.S. second or perhaps a supplemental trademark registration, which don't necessarily give you legal rights, but do conclusively establish that you were using the mark in a particular place from a particular time which would discourage anyone else from trying to get a trademark of their own and oust you from using yours. Sometimes trademark examiners are lazy and let generic marks get registered even though they shouldn't. Hard to say. They shouldn't be able to get a trademark in the U.S. on that basis, but the quality of trademark examination varies from country to country, and from examiner to examiner. Every once in a while I see an approved registration for a mark that should totally be disqualified and I shrug my shoulders and ask myself why I always clear a clear &quot;no&quot; from the PTO when I try to submit a mark like that and somehow the bozo who submitted that mark got it approved when it should be clearly ineligible for registration - for example, &quot;Palisade Red&quot; for red wine made in Palisade, Colorado. A lesser level of trademark registration such as a state trademark or a supplemental register mark discourages an otherwise lenient examiner from approving an already dubious mark and strengthen your case if you ever need to seek to have their mark cancelled.
Good question. A trade mark simply protects the company's exclusive right to use it to identify their goods and services. (R) means that the trade mark has been registered, TM means that, while not registered, the company is claiming a trade mark. Trade marks do not have to be registered to be enforceable. You are certainly not infringing their trade mark by what you are doing and you are not laying claim to the trade mark, so there is no requirement to use the symbols. Best practice is to use the symbols and identify who they belong to: "Intel and Core are trade marks of xyz".
Do I have to pay taxes if I register the domain but the website income belongs to someone else? No. The person or company who runs, and/or profits from, the business is the entity under obligation to pay all the applicable taxes: Value Added Tax, income tax, corporate tax, and so forth. Unless you charge a significant amount therefor (see the comments), the mere registration of just one domain is unlikely to trigger tax obligations.
I am answering primarily with regard to the U.S. Lanham Act (15 U.S.C. § 1501 et seq.) and state trademark laws in the U.S., but except as noted, these concepts are widely honored internationally in trademark law. As a general rule, generic names cannot be trademarked. Thus, you can't trademark "liquor store" for a liquor store, or "Calendar" for a calendar, but you might be able to trademark "liquor store' for a copying machine line, or "Calendar" for a perfume. Sometimes a trademark can be obtained for a stylized logo incorporating a generic name (e.g. "liquor store" in bold pink 48 point comic-sans), but to be valid, the trademark must disclaim any assertion of rights in the mere genetic words themselves. Also, sometimes a trademark that is descriptive but not truly generic, like "Palisade Red" for red wine made in Palisade, Colorado (as opposed to the truly generic name "red wine"), can acquire what is known as a "secondary meaning" through exclusive use over a period of time while registered with the Patent and Trademark Office, without contest from anyone else. If it meets these requirement it can win an entitlement to trademark protection. But, the nuances of this particular route to trademark protection are particular to U.S. Lanham Act (which is the name of the federal trademark law in the U.S.). Domain names and entity names in a particular jurisdiction are somewhat different. While it is possible for two competing products or firms to share a generic name, it is not possible for two owners to have precisely the same domain name or precisely the same entity name in the same jurisdiction, even if the firms seeking the same name sell completely dissimilar types of products. For example, there can only be one: "Calendar.com" domain name, even if one company uses the name "Calendar" to sell calendars and the other company uses the name "Calendar" to sell perfume. In those cases, however, it is relatively straightforward to determine what names are and are not taken.
No An actual price is merely descriptive, amd cannot be a trademark, any more that "computer" can be for a PC. A phrase including a price could be a trademark. Once upon a time, Pepsi used the slogan "Twice as much for a nickel too" which ws, or may have been, a trademark. They hypothetical Christopher Columbus Pizza could use a phrase such as 'A new world of flavor for only $14.92", but not, I think, the price alone.
By which law I am enforced to share my personal details (such as my full name) on forum publicly to on-line people which I even don't know (when commenting on random posts)? Contract Law. Google have made it a term of the contract that you use your full name. You can: contact Google and negotiate a change to that term, accept that term, choose not to enter the contract. so I can enforce on my privacy rights without removing my Google Plus account? As a person subject to UK law, your privacy rights involve limiting who and in what circumstances Google can divulge personal private information to. Your name is not personal private information; things like your medical history and bank balance are. Aside from that, you do not have a right to privacy. Anything you do or say that is visible or audible from a public place (like the internet) or a private place where the person in control of that place does not insist on your privacy (i.e. almost everywhere that you are not in control of) is public!
You cannot copyright a word or name in and of itself, so you can't sue someone for having a novel titled 13 so long as their novel is distinct from your own. Trademarks can use certain words or word combinations, but often in a way that is stylized or symbolic of a particular unique style and may include font, coloring, and other unique artistic takes. For example, McDonalds cannot copyright or trademark the letter &quot;M&quot; but it can trademark the &quot;Golden Arches&quot; a unique stylized &quot;M&quot; that they use as signage to at all their locations. If the name is a brand of a certain product such, then the name can be trademarked but only with respect to that product. For example, if the Acme Wash-Master is a dish washing machine they can't sue Ace Wash Master, a unique dog bathing system, for using the name &quot;Wash Master&quot; since it's both styled different (Acme uses a dash between words. ACE uses a space) and non-competitive product lines (most people would not wash dishes in a dog bathing device... and one would certainly hope that no dog owners ever said to themselves &quot;Fido stinks and my tub is busted. The dish washer will do in a pinch!&quot;).
Yes you can. The pieces of information you are going to include are facts. Facts are not copyrightable. The names will be trademarks but you will not be pretending to have any connection with them, so just using them for reference is fine.