Intellectual Property Law
Trademarks
A trademark is a word, a group of words or a logo that is used in connection with the sale of goods and services to distinguish them from those made or sold by someone else. Words and logos used in the sale of services, such as insurance companies, sports teams and rock groups, are called service marks.
By using a trademark or service mark in the sale of goods or services, the owner of a mark acquires the right to exclude others from using a similar mark on other products in a way that is likely to confuse the purchasing public. This is a valuable right to a business entity, because of the time and effort invested in building public goodwill in a product and the mark.
There is also a federal Trademark Act that provides for registration of marks used or intended for use in interstate commerce.
Trademark protection also protects the public against the consequences of confusion, buying something
which they believe to be one thing when in fact it is something else. Such well-known trademarks and service marks as Pepsi, GAP, Hilton, AT&T, are widely recognized by consumers as reliable signals that a product or service offered for sale originates from the same source year after year, and that the quality of the product or service will not vary. Business competitors invest millions of dollars in advertising to publicize the goodwill that marks represent. Consumers identify such marked goods as having particular characteristics and merit. In our market economy, trademarks play a critical role in the language of advertising. Competition would indeed be cumbersome and impractical without them.