DILUTIN' TOOTIN'; MORE GRUMBLES

US Dilution Act: the final countdown

The IPKat learns from the Trademark Blog that the US Congress has sent the Trademark Dilution Revision Act 2006 to the President for signing. This is the Bill that will reintroduce a likely dilution standard into US trade mark law and provides definitions of blurring and tarnishment. It has proved particularly controversial in recent months because of fears that it restricts the available defences in not only dilution cases, but also in other trade mark cases.

All aboard the dilution express

The IPKat says that this Bill would be welcome if it cleared up the uncertainty that has surrounded dilution since its inclusion in US federal trade mark law. However, the most recent draft he’s seen won’t achieve that objective. Particularly weak are the lack of a test for tarnishment and the (deliberately?) overly inclusive test for blurring.


For the avoidance of doubt

Some IPKat readers came away with the impression that IPKat co-blogmeister Ilanah is a fan of the new Patent Office website. Careful readers will have noted that what she actually complimented was the website’s typeface [they will also have noticed that she likes writing about herself in the third person rather too much].

Her experiences with the new website haven’t been happy. Conducting a Google search on IP-related matters now brings up what looks like a positive result, but in fact leads to a message that reads as follows:

The Patent Office web site was redesigned on September 24th 2006
You have been referrred to a page that no longer exists from http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=GGLD,GGLD:2005-13,GGLD:en&q=performers+moral+rights .
Unfortunately, we are unable to offer an equivalent page at this time so you will be automatically redirected to the new Patent Office home page in 10 seconds.
If you are not redirected then please use this link

So far as the Kat can see, a load of older material has silently been removed from the site, which doesn’t exactly help researchers. Ilanah paid a trip to the ‘Way Back Machine’ in the hope of digging the material out, but the archived versions don’t seem to include files like consultation documents.

Some more successful webbed feat

The IPKat also wonders what the fate of http://www.intellectual-property.gov.uk/ (which is showing ‘latest news’ from July) is now that IP for laypeople seems to be the function of the Patent Office website.