Posts in Holiday Posts

Today marks 20 years since the date of IPWatchdog.com’s launch. Happy Birthday to Us! As IPWatchdog Founder and CEO Gene Quinn recalled at the 10-year mark, in 1999 he was living in Orlando, Florida, and planning to embark on a career as a full-time law professor. But things didn’t quite turn out that way. Quinn first purchased the IPWatchdog URL in 1998 with the intention of providing a service to evaluate stocks based on IP portfolios. But when his partners in that plan slowly began leaving the dream behind for law firm jobs, Quinn decided to create a platform of his own, mainly summarizing “literally every IP case in America” in one paragraph each week. “The target audience was potential clients and IP attorneys,” Quinn recently told Eli Mazour for the Clause 8 podcast. “I had more of a belief than a plan that what I was doing was going to be worthwhile,” Quinn said. “Even if I didn’t figure out how to turn it into a business, I knew it would be beneficial because more people would know who I was.” Tonight, IPWatchdog will celebrate its 20th anniversary in style with the many close friends, colleagues and readers Gene and Renée have met over the years. Below, we share some of their thoughts on what IPWatchdog, and Gene and Renée, have meant to them and to the IP community over these past two decades.

This week in Other Barks & Bites: the PTAB institutes IPRs despite arguments that the Chinese government was an unnamed real party-in-interest; the Federal Circuit dismisses appeals of PTAB decisions denying institution on three IPRs; USPTO seeks public comments on examination guidance for artificial intelligence inventions, announces a public hearing on proposed trademark fee adjustments, and is facing backlash for seeking proof of citizenship for trademark applications; Tesla avoids a 10% tax on auto sales in China; the Department of Defense gets closer to establishing an IP protection team; former Google engineer Anthony Levandowski is charged with trade secret theft; trademark protection cases in Dubai have risen 63%; the Copyright Royalty Board announces an intent to audit Sirius XM Radio; and Amazon’s Audible faces copyright infringement suit over text captioning feature.

As we enter the August heat, it’s worth remembering some of the patents that have made summers more bearable through the years, for kids and adults alike. Below are three that stand out from my lifetime—unfortunately, the oft-cited on IPWatchdog and now-popular Bunch O’ Balloons toy was well after my time. Let us know in the comments which inventions made your summers cooler.

IPWatchdog has been publishing readers’ and staff picks for the Top 25 songs of all time for the past four years on the Fourth of July. See previous posts here, here, here, and here. Not one to snub tradition, this year it’s my turn. I was raised chiefly in the 1980s and 90s, but my heart has always been with 60s/70s folk music and classic rock (while my tween friends were fawning over NKOTB I was renting Yellow Submarine and Help! at Blockbuster). At nine years old, my father took me to Tower Records to purchase all of his favorite Beatles albums on cassette—loving the Beatles is passé now, but it’s sentimental in my case. The first song I fell in love with was Maxwell’s Silver Hammer, because it’s silly, and I was nine. That one didn’t make the list, but the Beatles—and Lennon specifically—set the standard for my musical tastes going forward, lyrics being key. This exercise was much harder than I expected, and my final list looks nothing like I thought it would off the top of my head. There are so many great songs across so many genres and eras from a musical and lyrical perspective that it would be impossible to choose—so in the end I just went with the songs that have had personal meaning to me throughout my life. Some of them may not be so technically “top”, but this list is all about the memories.

Today is Alice’s fifth birthday; some may not be celebrating, but as a birthday gift, John Vandenberg argues the decision was not new law and should not be abrogated. – On the third day of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee – IP Subcommittee’s hearings this month on whether to radically revise the standards for patent eligibility, I testified on behalf of our patent system’s under-appreciated second engine of innovation. Below are some of the key arguments I made in my oral and written testimony and my thoughts on why the Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank decision was good law that should not be abrogated. Much of the anti-Alice commentary touts our patent system’s first engine of innovation, which uses the lure of monopoly profits or royalties to incentivize innovation and the public disclosure of those innovations. Today’s Sec. 101 jurisprudence is said to harm that first engine of innovation, particularly in life sciences where it is easier to get a patent in Europe and China than in the U.S., causing investment in personalized therapy and medicine R&D in the U.S. to suffer. While some question those factual premises, the “101 status quo” camp primarily responds that Alice (along with IPRs) has curtailed abusive patent troll litigation, cutting patent litigation costs by 40% or more. But, another important point has received little attention: expanding what can be patented, and how claimed, risks harming our patent system’s second engine of innovation.

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) established World IP Day (WIPD) 19 years ago to celebrate the day on which the WIPO Convention entered into force: April 26, 1970. With nearly five decades under its belt, WIPO has had its successes and scandals, but there can be no doubt that IP rights are more harmonized now than ever before. This year’s WIPD theme is “Reach for Gold: IP and Sports.” While the topic may seem slightly off-mark to some, with so much else to talk about in the context of a rapidly-evolving global digital economy in which IP rights are becoming both more crucial and increasingly threatened in many jurisdictions, it does underscore the degree to which IP permeates industries and facilitates consumer experiences.In honor of World IP Day, we asked the experts to weigh in on how far we’ve come in the two decades since the holiday was established, and what the future holds. As usual, there were optimists, pessimists, and those in between. Here’s what they had to say.

Many readers will know that IPWatchdog, Inc. is run by partners in marriage and business, Founder and CEO Gene Quinn and Chief Operating Officer Renée Quinn. But fewer may know the story behind the couple, or how and why Renée chose to make the obscure world of intellectual property—a term she had not heard prior to meeting Gene—her own.

Since America’s earliest days, a lot of creative and innovative toys have come through the consumer marketplace. Many becoming so iconic they have become household names and synonymous with a moment in time for America’s youth. Some of the most popular of these toys that continue to show up year after year under Christmas trees were patented… It wouldn’t be a traditional Christmas at IPWatchdog unless we spent some time profiling some cool innovations that relate to the holiday season. So today, I return to one of our all time favorite articles. Five years ago we published The Top 10 Most Iconic (and Patented) Toys and last year we published The Most Iconic (and Patented) Games. With Christmas firmly in mind, it is time to revisit and expand these lists. When initially published some truly iconic classic toys and games were inexplicably left missing. So, with the hours winding down before Santa Claus makes his way down chimneys across the world, join us as we look back at some of the most popular toys and games of all time, as well as the patents behind them.

It is hard to believe, but Christmas is just around the corner — only two weeks away. For those looking for the perfect gifts for the nerd in your life — perhaps a beloved patent attorney or maybe an engineer, scientist or inventor — here are a few can’t miss gifts for your consideration. As of the time of publication all are still available to be received before Christmas.

It is that time of year where we annually pause as a nation, taking time out of our busy lives to visit family, watch football, eat too much turkey and other holiday foods, and read about patents that related to turkeys in one way, shape or form.  Well, most of the nation won’t be engaging in the later, but obviously you are here, it is a holiday and you are reading IPWatchdog.com. Predicting you were going to spend a portion of the day reading about patents that in some way relate to turkeys was really a lay-up in the world of predictions and prognostications!

James Madison — the fourth President of the United States and the father of the U.S. Constitution — wrote the usefulness of the power granted to Congress in Art. I, Sec. 8, Clause 8 to award both patents and copyrights will scarcely be questioned… There is little doubt that patents were viewed by both Washington and Madison to be centrally important to the success of the new United States. The importance is only underscored by the fact that the only use of the word “right” in the U.S. Constitution is in reference to authors and inventors being granted exclusive rights. In other words, the only “rights” mentioned in the Constitution are patents and copyrights.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office is celebrating Valentine’s Day with a special world premiere music video featuring a Barbershop Quartet singing the praises of — and professing love for — patents and trademarks… Lyrics were written by the USPTO’s own Matt Palumbo, and Steve Delehanty of the Alexandria Harmonizers arranged it for four voices. The singers are the Alexandria Harmonizers’ Anthony Colosimo, Christian Hoff, Andrew Havens and Joseph Cerutti.

Several years ago we profiled the Top 10 Iconic (and Patented) Toys in our Christmas Eve edition. This year we decided to profile the most iconic and patented games, many of which are still likely to be found waiting for good little girls and boys under the Christmas tree. Profiled are Monopoly®, Rubik’s Cube, Battleship, and Rock’em Sock’em Robots, Twister and Simon.

There is no doubt that Santa Claus contributes greatly to the staggering 2017 predictions for holiday spending… Indeed, after reading all these patents (and the many others I found) it seems clear that there is a long tradition of inventors seeking patents on various items inspired by or relating to Santa Claus himself. And unlike many other celebrities, no doubt owing to Santa’s jolly nature, he seems perfectly comfortable with inventors using his name and likeness as they invent toys, figurines and other gadgets that are useful for conjuring up the loving spirit of the man during the holiday season.

Dear Mr. Claus: You recently contacted this office to confirm the availability of your proposed “SANTA CLAUS” trademark for use in your business and, if this mark is non-infringing, to assist you in registering it for U.S. and international use. For these purposes you describe your business as “delivering games and toys to good little boys and girls as gifts for Christmas.”