For me, the biggest thing, I guess, yesterday, or one of the most valuable things was really
like, okay, search the trademark if it's already there.
And then look for your website, get your website and then do your application.
So that was the biggest thing.
And then I actually jumped into VIP like five minutes before VIP and, yeah, that was a whole
nother level.
It was amazing.
Just, you know, the questions, like, I love answers that are just down to the point.
And I, you know, it really helped me a lot to even understand because it's all, like,
it's a whole new world for me.
So yeah, it was definitely super valuable.
Wonderful.
Awesome.
So glad that you could get the chance to go live when it didn't work for you earlier today.
Awesome, Cher.
Saw a lot of people getting those same ahas.
So raise your hand if you would love to share just like you're just so jazzed about what you
learned yesterday, something that you're going to immediately, you probably already started
sharing.
Raise your virtual hand because I don't see everybody right now.
I'm not in gallery mode.
But go down to the bottom.
It says reactions.
If you don't know how to do that and raise that virtual hand like I just did, it's over
on this side of my eyes yellow because I just do yellow because I like it to be seen.
I don't.
You can change your colors of your hand.
Who else could we love to hear from you?
Love to have another share from yesterday.
You got some big wows.
In the meantime, thank you, everybody, for what you posted.
We were watching those last night and they were so great.
Everything you guys said, it was really awesome to see all of the different things that you
guys were taking away and how it already has an impact on you.
So we were so happy to see that it's already made such an effect on you guys.
Thanks for posting.
Super true.
Tani.
Tani, Tani, Tani.
Highlight it.
Hold on.
Give me a second.
Adding the spotlight.
Talk to us, sister.
VIP was amazing because Peter answered some questions that I had.
So that was great to have a hot seat with him.
And the intent to use application is pretty, that's pretty awesome that you don't have to have your idea,
like you don't have to use it right away.
But if you need it, you get to follow the application for it and use it within like six months or so.
I like that.
Good stuff.
And with extensions.
Yes.
You can get up to three.
Yep.
Three years.
Yep, three years.
You got it, girl.
Thanks for sharing.
Love to have you here.
You bring such a great joy.
Highlight you, Miss Linda.
Love to hear from you.
Go ahead, unmute yourself.
And what was most valuable to you from yesterday?
Well, I think the most valuable was the thing about don't go searching for domain names before you've done a trademark search.
Because I think it's been kind of taught, you know, to go quick to domain names and get your domain set up.
So it was kind of unlearning and relearning.
So but it was very, very helpful.
So those are the things I'm looking for is to do's and not to do's even more so.
And Peter's just terrific.
I just I just love him.
He's such a he makes these things can be very technical, very difficult and dry.
But he makes it so interesting and just fun.
And I'm looking forward to more.
I was wondering if you could put in that wonderful sheet that Peter has.
And if you put in the chat again, I was trying to think I downloaded, but I can't find it real quick because I was going to print it out so I can go, you know, while he's talking, then I could look at it.
But if you could put it in the chat again, then I can, you know, go back and forth and look at it as he's talking.
Yeah, we can sure make that happen.
Okay, great.
Well, I'm not the best at the computer.
So I thought, I know I downloaded it, but I can't find it where it is on my computer.
And I had the printer on it.
I was going to print it out.
And it's like, I'll have to do it later.
I'll have to hunt and peck.
So good.
Well, yeah, we'll get that for you.
Thank you for sharing, Linda.
All right, Linda, it's there in the chat for you.
Oh, terrific.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
It's probably in your download folder in your pictures.
on your computer, but it's also in the Facebook group.
I posted a link there too.
So if you end up feeling like you need to find it again,
you can go into our Facebook group.
Oh, great.
That's terrific.
I appreciate that information.
First of all, Linda, thank you so much.
Those are such kind words.
I'm gonna replay them over and over
so I could feel good all day.
Oh.
Well, they're real words, authentic words.
Thank you so much.
No, this is, I mean, first of all,
I'm in a different environment right now.
I'm actually in my law firm right now.
We had a number of meetings earlier today.
And so I thought, you know what?
Let me break in the law firm this way.
We haven't actually done a challenge from the law firm.
It actually goes all the way down that way and that way,
but just wanted to do it from here,
kind of Chris in the law firm, so to speak.
So, but separate from that,
I just wanna congratulate all you guys.
Like I'm amazed at how hungry you are
and how you're digging in
because there is a decent amount of content.
But what I did before we even started
was I went through all of your videos.
I went through your emails and I figured out
what are the main topics
that are really gonna help people.
And a number of the things
that we talked about yesterday,
specifically were on the issues that you raised.
I'm gonna be jumping into a number of things today
and I'm gonna elaborate upon what we spoke about yesterday
and then go a little deeper,
but we're not gonna go as deep as yesterday
because day one is usually a shocker to people.
People go, oh my gosh, I didn't even know
what common law was.
Like I didn't even know that you could file on the logo
separate from the word mark, separate from the slogan.
Like now, which one do I file for?
Like what if I don't have enough money
to file for every single one of them?
And so I thought I'm gonna break that down
a little bit today,
but I just wanna congratulate all of you
because I mean, you are so impressing me
in how dedicated you are to learning this
and I can see how you're gonna apply it into your business.
So one thing I want you to think about as you're learning
is I want you to think to yourself,
how exactly does this apply to my scenarios?
Okay, so we're gonna be digging
into a lot of different things,
but as we do, just kind of ask yourself,
okay, how does this apply in my business?
How does this apply in my business?
How can I train other people on this thing?
Whatever the situation is, figure out how to apply it.
The reason why is because then you can ask me questions
before you disappear, right?
Cause you've got access to me today
and then three more days, right?
But make sure you're here on day four
because I've got a special guest
who's gonna be here on day four.
Separate from that, some people actually,
Larissa, I don't even think you know
who the special guest is.
And then separate from that,
something is going to be mentioned to you
so that if you're feeling like,
I don't know how to handle these things
or there's a lot of things to think about,
we're gonna take care of that.
So don't worry, you've got video copies,
you've got something that's gonna be great
coming to you on day four.
So I've got you covered.
Don't worry, I've got you covered.
I know there's a lot of stuff
and I have no doubt that you're gonna pick up on it, okay?
All right, with that being said,
let me take one more share.
I'm gonna take one from Alicia.
Why don't you share what kind of appealed to you,
what jumped out at you?
Why don't you go ahead and unmute and go ahead and share.
Hi, Peter.
Yes, I wanted to mention about learning the lingo
so that I don't get charged more than I need to be charged.
And, or get more, I don't know,
it's just get more than I need.
That's what I wrote down.
So I have to go back and figure that out.
But someone sent me something today
and was talking about how the artists at Motown
back in the day, they didn't know about contracts and stuff.
So many of them got taken advantage of
and some of them were like given an allowance
of 10 to $20 a week.
Oh, yes.
Yeah, it was really, really bad.
And I was like, oh, I gotta learn the lingo.
Yeah, I mean, if you look at TLC
and some of the other bands like back in the day,
people that were number one,
literally number one on the charts,
year after year after year were coming home
after millions and millions and millions were sold,
they were bringing home like $50,000.
How is that even possible?
It's because they didn't understand how licensing works,
how copyrights work.
How do you make sure that you own or write title
and interest to certain things
as opposed to other parties?
These are really important issues to understand.
So we're gonna.
dig into that on copyright day,
we're gonna dig into that.
Yeah, cause I like Jackson five,
they didn't even own their name.
Oh, that's one of the worst.
That's one of the worst ones out there.
So there's a lot,
you're gonna learn a lot about different scenarios.
I'm gonna show you guys something
because someone raised something to me
and I wanna make sure that you have the opportunity
to understand something that's a little,
a little, it's not confusing,
but I think I thought a graphic would help.
So our friend Ray put together a little graphic here.
I wanna show you something here.
All right.
Look at Ray, isn't he amazing?
Can you guys see this on the screen yet?
The Nike stuff?
Great.
Yeah, we can see it.
All right, beautiful.
Okay, so, oh, hold on.
Oh, goodness.
It just locked up.
Yeah, can you guys hear me too?
Yeah, just fine.
I can also see my misalignments.
No, I'm just kidding.
Oh, we lost.
Oh, did we lose Peter?
No, he's here.
He just went off camera.
I feel like we just lost his camera.
Maybe so.
Okay.
All right, can you see me and hear me?
Yes.
That's really interesting.
This is why I always pray before I start.
Okay.
All right.
Right here, you've got multiple trademarks.
Somebody type in the chat,
how many trademarks do you see here?
Just type what you believe.
How many trademarks do you see?
Let's see what you guys have come up with.
Seven, eight.
Okay.
I see a lot of them.
Three, four.
All right, we see a lot.
Okay, so let me break this down for you.
The reason why I'm showing you this
is because there are multiple trademarks here.
And typically you'll see Nike, you'll see the Swoosh,
and then you'll see Just Do It.
And then you'll see Just Do It right next to it, right?
Remember how yesterday I told you
there are three different trademarks in doing that?
Okay.
I wanted you to be able to see it here.
So even though Nike will typically
show you Nike inside of the Swoosh,
and even underneath it, they'll say Just Do It,
that's technically three different trademarks.
This is important to understand
because if you wanna stop people from taking your Swoosh,
you better own the Swoosh alone.
If your Swoosh is part of a bigger trademark filing
that has like five different things in it,
like Nike, Swoosh, Just Do It, and all this other stuff,
then it's gonna be more difficult
for you to enforce just the Swoosh alone.
So if you file just the Swoosh alone,
it's gonna be way more beneficial if you use it alone.
So what I would do is I would file
for registration number 1284385, which is the Swoosh.
I would file for that alone.
Separately, I would file for Nike alone,
which is registration number 1277066.
And then separate from that,
I would file for Just Do It, right?
Now you may use Nike with the Swoosh,
or you might use the Swoosh with Just Do It,
or you might use Nike Just Do It.
Whatever the case is, own your Swoosh.
That's good.
I like that, Joe.
Own your Swoosh.
We gotta use that.
That's actually pretty good.
Thanks, Joe.
So you wanna realize that in your scenario,
you may have multiple trademarks
that are being used in your own logo.
That might be a problem.
So try to figure out what part is really important.
And if you're using that part alone,
like you're using Nike alone, file for Nike alone.
And then you can have the Nike in there
with the Circle R next to it,
and then you can have the Swoosh.
And if you get the Swoosh registered,
put the Circle R next to that one too, okay?
One of the things we talked about yesterday in VIP
was when do you use the TM and when do you use the Circle R?
This is really important to understand.
If you use a Circle R before you get a federal registration,
you can be sued for that.
It's called tortious interference with business practice,
unfair business practice, okay?
It's illegal.
The reason why it's illegal
is because you're telling everybody out there,
you cannot use this trademark
because I have a federal registration.
for it when you actually don't have
a federal registration for it.
And so other people will stop using it
just because you scared them, but you actually,
it's kind of like impersonating a police officer.
Nobody would do that.
So don't impersonate a federal trademark owner
because you don't actually own it, okay?
So I just want to share that with you,
really important to understand.
Another thing, what if somebody owns $90,000
Nike and you have like Nike Blizzards,
like something like that.
Type in the chat whether you believe
you can file a trademark application
for Nike Blizzards when somebody owns Nike.
Just type yes or no in the chat.
No, yes.
I don't see any maybes.
Let's just see nos and yeses right now.
Nos, nos, okay.
All right, maybe, there's a maybe.
Keith, it would be you, Keith.
That's good.
Could be by Alicia.
All right, so here's the situation.
If somebody has a federal registration,
all right, Jackie, you must be a lawyer
because that's a lawyer's answer, depends.
That's how every lawyer answers everything, depends.
So here's the situation.
If the trademark is there,
adding a word to a trademark does not make it
so that you don't commit trademark infringement.
What do I mean by that?
If somebody owns Microsoft, which clearly they do,
and you come out with a software program
called Microsoft Local, something like that,
you're still gonna get sued by Microsoft.
The reason why you're gonna get sued by Microsoft
is because you're using their name for software
and Microsoft owns the name Microsoft for software.
So you can't just add a word to something
that somebody else has and believe
that you can get ownership to that name.
You can't do that.
I can't tell you how many times I've seen this.
People get cease and desist letters or they get sued
because they added one word or two words
and they say, well, it's not the same.
Just adding something to something that's an infringement
does not mean that it no longer infringes.
But what about the opposite?
What about removing a word?
That's the more difficult question.
So somebody owns like Microsoft Office or Microsoft Excel
and you decide to say, well, I'm just gonna take Microsoft
and use that.
Well, obviously Microsoft is a famous trademark
so you're not gonna do well if you try to do that.
I would suggest you don't do that.
You'll get sued.
But in certain cases, one of the words
in the longer trademark is something
that's called descriptive.
I'm gonna take a moment to talk to you
about what descriptiveness is.
We're gonna do a live trademark search today
together as well.
I'm gonna show you how to use the USPTO website.
So we'll go through that today in some detail.
But I wanna make sure you understand this concept
of descriptiveness, okay?
If you have a company and what you do is you sell T-shirts
and you call it the T-shirt selling company,
you can't get a registration for that
because it's merely descriptive.
You cannot own a name or a slogan
for something that's descriptive of what you're doing
or what you're selling.
Descriptiveness is not allowed.
You will get rejected all of the time, all right?
If you have brown cars that you're selling,
you cannot open the brown car auto sale company.
You can't do that because it's brown cars.
Like it's, you can't own something that's descriptive.
And the reason why you can't own it specifically
is because then nobody else could use those words
to describe exactly what it is, right?
So if you're selling gooey cookies,
you can't say the gooey cookie company
because it's gooey cookies.
It's descriptive of what you're selling.
If it's descriptive of what you're selling
or the service that you're providing, you can't own it.
So as an example, there's a place in New Hampshire
called Apple Orchard Farm, right?
Now guess what they sell.
Somebody just guess.
I know this is really hard for you.
It's probably difficult.
But somebody guess.
I didn't even finish the question.
Yeah, that's it.
Exactly.
They sell apples.
Plums, yes.
They sell plums, that's it. No, they sell apples. So the reason why they can't own the name
Apple Orchard Biscuits, this is getting out of hand, this is just getting out of hand.
The reason why they can't own Apple Orchard Farm is because it's an apple orchard farm.
So this company gets mad when another apple orchard opens and guess what they name themselves,
Apple Orchard Farm. So the old apple orchard farm from like 37 years of existing is mad that this
new apple orchard farm opens up and says, that's not right, they shouldn't be able to use that.
So they write a letter to them and they say, hey, you can't do that. This other company writes back
and says, what are you talking about? We sell apples and it's an apple orchard and there's a
farm. So we're called the Apple Orchard Farm and one company could not stop the other because
the name was merely descriptive. Now, why is a trademark important? The reason why a
trademark is important is because it identifies a source of goods. It lets you know something about
the party that's providing the goods, the quality, the cost. We talked about this a little bit
yesterday. So you want to make sure that you're the only one using that name or using that logo
because if other people are using it, then what will happen is the kids say, hey, let's go to
Apple Orchard Farm. Somebody types on Google Apple Orchard Farm. It loads up the new company
and then the family takes a road trip to Apple Orchard Farm new company instead of the old
company. So what happens? The old company is losing money. Do you see how that works? This is
why your name is so important. You need to make sure that you have a unique name. You have a
unique logo because if you don't, other people will use that same name and they will go and
they'll go ahead and take your own business. They'll take the market share and then it becomes
more difficult for you to maintain your client base. OK. And as we discussed yesterday, if you
have a logo created, make sure whoever you hire for the logo assigns all right title and interest
to you. All right. Get it in writing before you pay them, because I guarantee you after you pay
them, they will not give it to you unless you pay extra money. And I don't want any of you running
into that situation. OK. All right. But isn't swoosh descriptive? No. So swoosh. All right.
Let's let's dig into Jill. So Jill is an alumni and she actually asked great questions. So I love
when she shows up. OK. So a swoosh on sneakers. The swoosh is not descriptive of the sneakers.
Right now, the name swoosh may be descriptive of the thing that's called a swoosh.
But what you're looking at is the goods or services that have that swoosh on it.
The swoosh is on sneakers. So since the swoosh is on sneakers, you don't look at sneakers and go,
oh, man, that's a swoosh sneaker like nobody would even know what that means. So it's not
descriptive of the goods. OK. All the book title. All right. Jill, I'm going to ignore you for a
moment, OK? She's going to torture me. All right. So let me dig into something even deeper here.
How do you determine whether there is trademark infringement?
OK. I actually like this big setup because I can see all of you here. I can see all of
your comments there. I can see all the graphics there. I just want to bring the camera down.
I'm going to bring it down here more so I'll be able to see you guys at a more level way. So.
All right. So. How do you determine whether or not there's trademark infringement?
I want to break this one down in some detail and go slow. I'm going to drop a graphic for all of
you tonight. All right. The graphic is going to show you every every single step of the likelihood
of confusion test. OK, I'm going to break. I'm going to send it to all of you. So everybody has
a copy of this. I just I just think it's going to be easier for you if I just drop it for you.
So I will be sending that to you. But let me go through all of the ingredients for the likelihood
of confusion test. And Ray, in the meantime, can you do me a favor? Can you drop the link?
It's on that list. Drop the link for the document for likelihood of confusion. All the steps. OK,
yeah, I don't think I think that's the one thing I don't have from you, but I'll make a note.
It's if you don't have it, I'll give it to you. I just want everybody to have a copy.
copy of it, because it's a lot easier.
I think I've got it.
I'll dig it up.
Yeah, thanks.
I appreciate it.
Together, we make it work.
One year later, I think we got it all.
I have a copy of it as well.
I'd rather just everybody see it.
Matter of fact, I already found it.
I'm pretty fast at that.
Right click, copy, paste.
There you go.
All right, so everybody has a copy of it.
All right, what I'm going to be sharing with you right now
these are all the steps associated with.
This should be the link here.
Hopefully, you guys can use that.
Yeah, OK.
All right, I'm going to share my screen so you can see it all
with me, OK?
So what I'm showing you right now
is this is how you determine whether or not
you can use a certain trademark.
OK?
This is exactly what you would look at.
So let me just open the slide.
Don't you freeze on me.
Yep, it froze again.
It's so funny.
We have never had these issues.
Now, all of a sudden, things are freezing.
I see it.
All right, can you see it now, guys?
Yes.
Give us a thumbs up.
And we lost Peter.
It's really interesting that we've had.
That's twice now we've had an issue.
Can you guys see the screen OK?
Yes, we see it again.
OK, great.
All right, good.
These are all of the parts that are included
in a likelihood of confusion test.
So let me go into them in detail.
All right, the first one.
Imagine the trademark is, let's say, Nike, right?
Let's say N-I-K-E. And somebody else has N-I-K-Y.
And they want to determine whether or not
they can use that trademark, all right?
So N-I-K-E, N-I-K-Y, those are the two different trademarks.
They're both being used for sneakers.
These are the things that you're going
to look at to determine whether or not there's infringement.
The first part right here is similarity or dissimilarity
of the marks.
Now, what I mean by that is, how does it look?
N-I-K-E versus N-I-K-Y. That's the first test.
Do they look similar?
Yeah, they look kind of similar.
I mean, the only difference is literally one letter.
So since they kind of look similar, that weighs against you.
The next part, how does it sound?
Nike, Nike, sounds the same.
So that's a second thing that's weighing against you.
Nike, Nike, all right?
A third thing is called commercial impression.
What commercial impression means is,
like, how does the word make you feel?
So as an example, if I said ripper, right?
That has a certain feeling to it.
Ripper versus, let's say, angelic, right?
That has a certain feel to it.
So what's the general commercial impression
when you hear the word Nike, right?
So you kind of look at the two.
Mute, Morgan, please.
All right, so now you've got appearance, the look of it,
you've got the sound, and you've got the general feeling.
Now, the next thing that you'll look at
is the goods or the services, are they similar?
So sneakers versus sneakers.
Yeah, that's a negative.
So N-I-K-E, N-I-K-Y, they sound the same,
they look kind of similar.
Connotation, I don't know that anybody feels
any certain way when they hear the words.
But separately, when you look at the goods,
they're both sneakers, that's a problem.
The next thing that you look at is where are they sold?
Well, they're both sold in the same kind of stores,
that's a problem.
Can you buy Nike, N-I-K-E, and N-I-K-Y at Target?
You can, that's a problem.
That means there's a likelihood of confusion.
That means the consumer may not be able to tell
which sneaker is from which company
because they're sold in the same place.
If the cost is similar,
then that means they also cost similarly,
they look similar, they sound similar.
All these things are negative.
They make it so that there might be a likelihood
of confusion in the public side.
The next thing you look at is, is it an impulse purchase?
What that means is, is it something that's...
that you buy that's like 20 bucks or is it something that costs $20,000 if it costs $20,000
in that kind of situation what's going on is there's a less of a likelihood of confusion
because nope there's not many people that are going to go out there and say you know what I'm
just going to throw $20,000 or something that's likely not going to happen what's more likely
going to happen is somebody's going to investigate who is actually selling this thing if they're
spending $20,000 on something okay but in this case nike nike and nike why if they're both
selling sneakers for 95 bucks well since there's similar costs there's a higher likelihood of
confusion all right now if there's a lot of other use of the same word so imagine there's a lot of
other uses of nike for sneakers and then this guy over here tried to go for nike why since there's
so many prior uses that decreases the chance of likelihood of confusion because everybody else is
using it now just to be clear all right so i make sure everybody understands this so please listen
to this okay as the firetruck goes by um remember just because other people are using a trademark
does not mean that you can use it i can't tell you how many times i've seen people start using
a name and say well everybody else is using it and they're the ones that get sued all of a sudden
they get sued and they they say well i don't understand like your honor there's 20 other
companies that are using this like they chose to sue me yeah they chose to sue you that's a problem
all right but but the defense is not well they sued me only that's not a defense a defense might
be well the the trademark doesn't have any distinctiveness because everybody else is using it
that might be a defense but in your case please don't start using a trademark just because you're
seeing everybody else use it okay um another thing to kind of look at is whether or not there's actual
confusion so if if nike nike got a phone call by somebody who picked up nike y and said hey
i bought your sneakers at target and i don't understand like why is there a y here are you
guys is this really you that's a sign of confusion in the market so that actually would weigh against
uh the party with the nike y all right because there'd be a high likelihood of confusion because
there's proof of actual confusion and then finally if it's a really strong mark mcdonald's
um nike apple microsoft intel when you have a trademark that's really really famous like that's
very well known the strength of the mark makes it so that if you use anything that's even close
you might get sued and the reason why you might get sued is because that that trademark is so
well known that it's gained an extra level of protection and so do yourself a big favor
if you're thinking oh man you know this is really famous trademark out there i want to use something
that's kind of close to it it's not exactly the same but it's kind of close because i want people
to to kind of remember remember like the famous trademark and and start looking at me and thinking
of me in a similar light don't do it don't do it all right i've had to defend companies against
microsoft against um mcdonald's um i mean i've represented mit stonyfield like all sorts of
different corporations around the world they have lots of powerful trademarks i can tell you that
they go heavily after anyone who uses anything even slightly similar so do yourself a favor and
stay away from trademarks that are very well known okay let me take two questions i i usually
don't do this and my people tend to tell me don't do this but i'm going to do it anyway
because i just want to take let me take two questions on what we've covered so far so far
for trademarks um only trademarks nothing else so it has to be specifically on a trademark issue
okay all right sean go ahead and ask your trademark question
you're muted
okay maybe there's overlap with copyright but i had a group of things a group of products
that i call them something there's an umbrella term for them and um then i decided well i'm
going to name my facebook group that and i went to do it and i got it all set up and
then i realized there's another one named that we've continued
to use that name.
And now I realize there's also a series
of books published that.
What's your question?
What's your question on trademarks?
So, I mean, first of all, maybe this is copyright.
I don't know.
And I don't know if I'm in infringement
of the fact that somebody else has books
that a series of books that have that same title.
Somebody else has a Facebook group with that same title.
Gotcha, okay.
All right, I got you.
All right, let me address this in general.
So it's a good question.
So if there is a name and it's used on a book,
book names are not trademarkable unless it's a series, okay?
So first thing, and we're all gonna do this together.
I'm gonna walk you all through a trademark search together.
So everybody understands how to do a trademark search.
We're gonna do this all slowly together.
I think this one is a series, by the way.
Okay, well, that's a good example.
So if it's a series, like, you know,
there's a number of books that are series,
like the Hobbit is a series, Harry Potter is a series.
There's a lot of different series, right?
So the name of a series can be protected
under trademark law, but a single name on a single book
that is not allowed to be protectable
under trademark law.
Now let's imagine that somebody has used a name
on a Facebook group, right?
Because I use a certain name on a Facebook group.
What I would do is what I'm gonna walk all of you
through right now, which is a trademark search.
I would determine whether or not the party
has a federal registration, but somebody type in the chat
the other thing you need to worry about.
What is the other trademark right that you might have
or that somebody else might have
that you have to worry about,
even if they don't have a federal registration,
they might have rights under exactly, Mark said it,
common law.
And so how can you determine potentially
if somebody has rights under common law?
What's some of the homework you can do on your own
before you actually talk with an attorney?
What's some of the homework you can do on your own
so that you're prepared and you bring your evidence
to the attorney for the analysis?
What's a website that you can go to
to actually determine whether or not
they've used that name before?
Somebody type in the chat.
Google domain search.
Yup, you can do that.
What was the one we talked about yesterday?
The Wayback Machine, exactly.
Right, Wayne.
Right, Ron.
So if you use the Wayback Machine,
you can go, thanks, Ray.
So what you can do is you can actually determine
whether or not a prior version of their website
had that name on it,
and that gives you a good idea
of whether or not they've been using it
in interstate commerce.
If they have been using it,
they may have rights under common law.
If they have rights under common law,
you may not be able to use it.
Oh, it's my, I'm glad you like that, Kristen.
Yeah, so it's pretty helpful to understand that.
Sean, I gotta stop you
because I gotta keep going, all right?
Oh, but if you were gonna do,
you said you were gonna do a search right now.
I wondered, do you wanna do it on this name
that I told you about?
We could try, sure.
Yeah, we could do that.
I mean, if it's okay to share it.
Yeah.
I'm getting scared to say anything out loud,
but okay, so it's this group of products I have.
Sean, Sean, I'm gonna mute you,
and when we get to the search, we'll talk, all right?
All right.
Okay, so does the Wayback Machine
infringe on copyright sites?
That's a good question, actually.
So the information on,
the information that the Wayback Machine is grabbing
is grabbing a copy of a prior version of a website, right?
Now, making copies of somebody else's website,
technically, as you'll learn tomorrow,
is copyright infringement.
So Mark raises a very good question.
How exactly is it that the Wayback Machine
is allowed to make copies of other people's websites
and display them and not get into trouble?
I've actually thought about this a few times.
I think that part of, not really fair use, no.
Fair use is, it's an exception to an exception.
If you're using fair use,
that means you've already committed copyright infringement,
and then after that, it becomes,
we're gonna talk about fair use on day three,
so you'll find out.
All right, so I'm gonna walk you all
through a search right now, a trademark search, okay?
But I want to make sure you understood
how you determine if there's trademark infringement,
because I'm trying to put this all together.
Here is this logo, here's this wordmark.
You want to determine, can I use it, right?
Remember how I told you before you go searching on the domain name, what are you doing?
You're doing a trademark search, right? So you're doing that search, you're seeing if
that name's available. Now that the name's available, then you can go and grab the domain
name and then go and grab your trademark application. Because if you grab your
trademark application first, somebody will buy the domain name and sell it to you for 2,500 bucks
instead of $8.95. So the sequence should always be trademark search, which I'm going to walk you
through now, then domain name. If it's available, grab it, then file with the USPTO. Don't file with
the USPTO first because the alternative is somebody will unfortunately blackmail you.
All right, so everybody go to USPTO.gov. That's where we're going to go.
So let me go there. And I'm actually going to do a search for my own thing because
I don't want to search somebody else's thing and then have them rely upon that
and believe that it's legal advice. So I'm going to search for something that everybody can use.
So let me share my screen with all of you right now. Everybody should be able to do this. And
just so everybody knows, this is going to be part of the homework assignment tonight,
which is to go and search for a trademark that you're using or one that you'd like to use.
Okay, now this is the USPTO website, United States Patent and Trademark Office.
Why does it keep crashing? Can you, I wonder if I can just ignore this. You guys can see me
right now. Can you hear me? Yes. All right. I'm just going to move the error message to the side.
I don't know why it keeps doing it.
And now we lost his sound. But while we're waiting for him, guys, I dropped a link in the chat
for the USPTO.gov website that he's on right now. It's a good idea for everyone,
especially if you're on a PC, to go click that link and open up a browser tab so you have it.
It's too bad we didn't get Peter frozen in a dance move. That would have been...
I wonder if he's stretching his bandwidth.
Right, Jaya. Yeah, today I noticed that Zoom actually asked for an update. And I'm not sure
if you guys know this, but probably say our February challenge, there was actually a lot of
foreign hacking going on on big systems like Zoom. And so there was a lot of technical issues
going on for a while too. I don't know if that's still the case, but sometimes there is some
interference there. Plus we're trying a new setup today, and I think it might be his HDMI cord.
I don't know. It might be the cord connecting to that computer so he can see all of you guys at
once. He should be logging back in here very soon. He's back. Yeah, it's kind of interesting
that that's happened. That's three times now. We've not had this happen before. So this is
interesting. In my opinion, it must be a lot of people that need this information.
Well, Peter, if it happens again, I'm just going to start clicking this will and aims
and start giving stuff away. Yeah. All right. Let's try this again.
I'm just finding this really interesting. We have not run into this problem, but we'll see
what's going on. All right. Let's see. Thank you, Lord. Let's have this just work. Okay.
Can everybody see the screen right now? Okay. Wonderful. All right. So you just click on
trademarks. You go to searching. Now, once you're on this screen here for searches,
can everybody see where it says search trademark database right there? Okay. All right. Let's spend
a little time here for a minute. All right. So there are two different ways you can do the search
here. The top portion here, this button here, this link here, and this button here, they do
the exact same thing. So don't try to figure out which one do I use. We can't tell what you're
pointing at. Somebody's unmuted. Who's unmuted? Sorry, that was me. I just couldn't see where
you were pointing at. This is Alicia. Oh, okay. Gotcha. So you don't see the hand right there
over the URL? All right. Let me see. Do you see it now?
I see it, Peter. It's over the purple part. It says trademark electronic search in parentheses.
It's the first one. Right. Right. Thanks, Alicia. Yeah. So that
One right there.
And then the other one is the button.
The button is after the word confusion right here.
You see the button?
Okay.
So both of those things do the same thing, okay?
So you just click on the URL and here you go.
You go to this screen right here.
Okay.
There are three different types of searches you can do.
I'm gonna teach you how to do the first one
and the second one.
For all you guys that are super geeks,
you can do the third one, all right?
The third one is using like Boolean logic.
So if you like using the if and not,
you know, the brackets, the equals or the greater than
or equal to all that, have at the third one.
I'm not gonna do that one here
because that's just too complex.
So the first one here, this is the most basic.
I will tell you that it's also kind of annoying
because you can't specify the goods.
You're just gonna look up a word, okay?
So let's say you believe,
let's say that you believe you came up with a new word
and nobody else has it, right?
So let's say that like Tani.
Tani says, I just came up with a brand new word.
It's Algevira, right?
And she says, nobody in the world
has ever heard of Algevira.
Well, then she could just come over here
and then type in, you know, Algevira and then click enter.
Well, there's nothing like it, you win.
There's a brand new word just for you, right?
That's a simple one, right?
Most things are not that simple.
Most things are variations of other words, okay?
Now, one thing I want you all to be aware of,
please, please understand this.
The searches that you're doing here,
these are basic, basic top level searches.
What do I mean by that?
You should not be relying upon the results here.
The reason why I'm saying that is because
the USPTO website, number one,
it doesn't always catch phonetic equivalents.
Does everybody know what a phonetic equivalent is?
By show of hands.
Yes, people understand.
All right, some people don't.
That's okay, let me explain.
Sounds like, phonetic, sounds like, right?
So does it like, does,
so if you see Nike, N-I-K-E and Nike, N-I-K-I-E
and Nike, N-I-K-Y, all of those sound the same.
So they're all technically phonetic equivalents.
But when I type in Nike, N-I-K-E,
the USPTO may not give me N-I-K-E-E
or N-I-K-E-Y or M-O-U-S-E.
You see what I'm saying?
So for that reason, you wanna be careful
relying upon what you're finding here.
What I would use the USPTO website for
is I would use it as a top level search,
what I call a knockout search.
All right, let me explain to you what a knockout search is.
Because first of all, what I'm showing you is a free tool.
This free tool will potentially save you
thousands upon thousands of dollars, okay?
Because if you've got a name
that clearly is not protectable
and you search by learning what I'm gonna show you right now
and you knock out the name,
then you don't need to call a lawyer
to find out whether or not you can use the name,
you know it's dead.
So you just saved yourself a phone call.
And remember, we as attorneys bill you per hour, right?
We have bill per hour requirements.
And so as you call and we're talking,
tick, tick, tick, tick, tick,
like you're being billed for that time.
Well, if you can do a quick search yourself
and knock out a few potential names,
you just saved yourself a ton of money.
So that's what I'm trying to do right here.
This is a very useful tool
to teach you how to do a knockout search.
But when you find something
that looks like it's available to use,
don't just go out there and use it.
What you should use this to do is to knock out,
let's say you have like seven potential names.
Look at them all up.
You may knock out like five of them and only have two left.
And then with those two that are left,
you call the lawyer for those two.
Instead of calling the lawyer for the seven,
you just saved a lot of money.
You're welcome.
You see what I'm saying?
That's what I'm trying to get at to you.
What you want to do is minimize the amount of time
that we as attorneys will spend on looking at things
that are not necessary.
All right, so this first site,
you can search for the word itself,
or you can search for a serial number,
a registration number.
Like if somebody has a registration number.
registration number already a trademark registration, you can search for that exact registration number here. If you so choose. Okay. Or if you know the owner of the trademark, right, you can actually search for the owner of the trademark right here.
And when you search for the owner of trademark. Do you see how I just searched for Nieves, which is my name is 251 records of different trademarks that are owned by a person named Nieves.
Right, here's one of mine protection portal I have a bunch of others to that are in here.
Yeah, so there's a bunch of mine that are in here. Okay. The whole point of my saying that, hey, somebody filed for my name. Who did that.
Yeah, that's not mine. I didn't file for a teddy bear. Alright, so the point being, where you can go and you can search for the owner of a trademark as well.
So if I'm thinking to myself, you know, Ron Gunderson, you know that guy, he's kind of sneaky. He's really smart.
And he may come out with a name that's very similar to one that I want to use because he's a smart guy.
I can actually search for Ron Gunderson here and see any trademarks that are he filed for. Okay.
It's a useful tool. But in general, if you're trying to find a trademark, let me show you what happens. If you type in Nike, N-I-K-E, look at what happens.
182 records. So you're getting a lot of different trademarks that have N-I-K-E in it. See, now remember what I told you about phonetic equivalence.
So look here. N-Y-K-1 did show up. That's a phonetic equivalent, right? So that's an example of where it did catch one, but it may not always catch it for you.
Now, let me show you something. Somebody asked a really good question in the chat.
I really like this setup because I can see all of your chat, too, which is helpful. But let me show you something. You see on the right side here how it says dead? You see that?
So you might be asking yourself, what does that mean, the trademark is dead? Like, what if I want to use a certain name and it shows up as dead? Does that mean I can use it?
The answer is not necessarily. You want to do additional work. So what you want to do at that point is if it shows up as dead, you want to click on it and you want to go down here and see who was the person who filed for it.
That's the applicant there. You can see under owner, that's the applicant. And then do some research on this company and find out whether or not they're still using it before you decide to go use it yourself, right?
Because again, what I taught you yesterday was this thing called common law trademark rights, right? So they may not have renewed their trademark.
They may have allowed their trademark to expire. But that doesn't mean that they're not still using it. So just because a trademark shows up as dead does not mean it's clear to use.
So make sure you do an extra layer of checking on your own to see whether or not you truly can use that name. Because if you miss that, you may believe that something, in fact, is available to use, and then get in a situation where you're accused of trademark infringement, okay?
Hey, Peter, can I ask a question, Peter? I see something that says abandonment date down there, right under dead. Can you kind of-
I'm sorry, who is that?
This is Morgan. I'm sorry.
Oh, hey, Morgan. All right, let me pull you up so I can see you. Okay, what was your question?
On that screen there, it says something underneath dead. It says abandonment date.
Abandoned?
No, no, underneath, right there where it says dead.
Yeah, that's when it went dead. That's when it went dead.
Okay, I want to make sure. Okay, all right.
Yeah, yeah, so that's a good question. So basically what happened is that this case went abandoned September 30, 2022, right? So that lets you know when it went abandoned.
Now, if you want to get really geeky on this, I'll show you what you can do. Right here, there's a button that says TSDR. Let's say you want to find out, well, why did it go abandoned, right?
So Morgan's like, you know what? I learned about abandonment. Now I want to know more.
So just click TSDR.
If you click TSDR, you can actually see the history of that case itself right there in front of you.
See that?
Do you guys see that? Does it show you a screen right now?
That changed? Okay, good. So you see right here where it says status? Dead. Application refused, dismissed, or invalidated. The trademark was refused, dismissed, or invalidated.
the office. So it tells you abandoned because the applicant failed to respond or filed a late
response to an office action. So it tells you exactly why it got abandoned. So you can go in
there. Guys, these are public documents, guys. This is all public documents. You can go here,
play around all you want. This is free. Go and play. Tonight, take the name of your company.
Type in, you know, type in the name and see whether or not there's a potential of a trademark
issue. Do some research on your own. This is free. The beauty of it, if you do the search and then
you're in VIP, obviously you can come in and just start asking questions like I search, I see this.
What do you think about that? We can just kind of talk. But the point of all this is that you
actually can do searching at no additional cost. Now, let me show you the search that I would do
personally. I don't like this one right here because it just gives you everything in the
kitchen sink. So the one I use is this one here, the second one. OK, this one I like.
You know, this one's a lot of fun. I see camouflage. She's like, yeah, I like this one. This is my
favorite. This one's good. All right. So this is what I click on. This is the one I use.
The beauty of this is that you can select under field. You can select any one of these categories,
OK, like the goods and services. And then I can come over here and I can type in footwear.
No, not footwear, footwear. No. How do you spell footwear? It's E-A-R, right?
E-A-R. That's it. Yeah. Footwear. OK, there's one. Right. And then under here, I can type in Nike.
And for Nike, for the field, I can look up. Let me let me give you a little
a little clue here or something that's going to help you a lot. You see this field here
that says non-punctuated wordmark. Use this one. This is one of the best ones to use.
Use non-punctuated wordmark. And then type in the word that you want to look up, OK,
and then use goods and services and type in some of the services that you want to use.
All right. Now, there's another thing that you need to do. Don't forget this.
Over here, you see the operator. Change that operator to and. If you leave it as or,
you're going to get everything that has you're going to get every trademark that ever existed
that has the word footwear under goods. And you're going to get every trademark that ever existed
that has Nike in it. That is you're going to get if I had to guess. But let's have fun.
Let's have fun. All right. Let's have a little fun here. For for a second, $50 gift certificate.
Amazon gift certificate for a second one. Type in the chat how many results you think
that you're going to get if you type in footwear and Nike with the or with or as an operator?
20,000. Let's see. 10,000. He puts a plus sign. Josiah knows how to play games. He puts a plus
sign. That's so good. But 500,000. Wow. 5,000, 50,000, 25,000. I'm going to think,
I think it's going to be like, I've never run this search. I think it's going to be like 18,000.
250,000. All right. Let's see what we get. Let's see what we get.
Submit query. Is everybody done? Because we're going to look at your what you typed in in a
second. And you can't. What was the last one? All right, Linda. Anybody else? Peter's going to break
the internet. 10 more seconds. Judy's guessing too. All right. Eight, seven, six. Alicia bet my
number. Alicia's smart. Five, four, three, two, one. All right. Let's see what we get.
How many did we get? 304,000. 304,000. I wasn't even close. I wasn't even close. Let's see who
was the closest. 250,000. Jenny said 200. No. I got Jiah. Jiah's got 250,000. Wow. 500,000.
Sunny said 500,000. Those are close. All right. So I think Jiah's the closest. Yeah.
So make sure you text me, please, to send out the other $50. I got it. Thank you so much. All right.
So let's go back now and run it the way it's supposed to be run. We're going to change it to
And you can imagine if you got 300,000 results,
by the time you're done reviewing them all,
you're probably won't be alive anymore.
So your company won't be very successful.
So I suggest that you use the and operator
instead of the or operator.
And so now you just commit,
you click submit query and see what we get.
Ah, that is way more reasonable.
We have 53, 53 is way more reasonable.
All right, so let me show you what I would do
in this situation.
Now, we know the name Nike is pretty popular.
So you might be thinking to yourself,
well, how do I know if it's a logo or if it's a wordmark?
Like, how do I know, like, is it an image
or is it a wordmark?
Okay, well, let me show you something you can do
that's really cool.
You see right here, this button says image list.
See that?
Click on that.
Look what happens.
This is so cool.
Now you can actually see the trademarks as images.
So you can see which ones are wordmarks,
which ones are logos.
You can look at them.
See right here, NTC, that is a logo, right?
Nike Yardline, that is a wordmark.
So you've got all these different things
that you can use now.
Let me back up over here.
You can use, as long as you use that button,
just click on that button there.
On the top, this is image list.
All right, image list will allow you
to see all the different images one by one.
Okay?
Now, let me show you another thing here on the searches.
You see the Reds number?
Can everybody still hear me okay?
Oh, I can't hear people.
Ray, can you hear me?
We can hear you.
Okay, good.
Just wanna make sure you can hear me okay.
All right.
You see the Reds number?
We're just behaving with that mute button.
All right, right here, Reds number.
That's your registration number, okay?
If there's no Reds number listed,
that means that they did not get a registered trademark yet.
Okay, that means it's still pending.
It's a trademark application that's still pending.
It's a trademark application that's been filed,
but it's still pending.
All right, once they get a Reds number,
that means they now have a registration.
When you get that Reds number,
that's when you can actually use your Circle R, okay?
So if you're trying to figure out,
can I use a Circle R now or not?
You need that Reds number.
When you get that Reds number, use your Circle R.
Until you get that Reds number, you can't use that Circle R.
If you're using a Circle R
before you get a registration number,
you can run into a lot of problems, okay?
All right, let me talk to you about one other thing.
I think, well, two other things real quickly,
and then we'll stop in five minutes, okay?
Let me stop sharing for one second.
Actually, let me show you one more thing here
before we jump off of this.
I just wanna show you a few other fields
that are really helpful.
If you click under the Field button,
a few other things that are really helpful, okay?
Goods and services, like I said,
that you can mention whatever you're using it on,
T-shirts, bags, jackets, pencils, pens, shoes,
bowling balls, whatever it is, you can list it there.
This next one here, international class, all right?
I'm gonna drop in the Facebook group tonight
a link to show you how to search
for the international class
that's associated with your goods and services.
Every single trademark falls into a international class,
every single one of them.
Every application that you file
will fall into a international class.
If it has to do with education, training,
like online training or anything like I'm doing here,
it's international class 41.
If it has to do with electronics, software,
that's international class nine.
Different goods have different international classes
and different services
have different international classes.
If you use the link that I'm gonna drop
in the Facebook group for you tonight
and you find where your goods or services belong,
you can actually type.
This is really, really neat
for doing an infringement analysis
is you can type here 009,
which is associated with software
and then type in something like Microsoft as a word mark.
And then the beauty of that
is it shows you all the trademarks
within that international class alone.
Why do you care?
care. The reason why you care is in that analysis of whether or not, when you're trying to determine,
am I going to get sued for using this name or not, right? And you're using the name Apple
for cell phones. Cell phones fall into international class nine. So why don't you do a search in
international class nine, right? So you look up Apple international class nine, because
that's where cell phones are. And then boom, you see the trademark right there. It shows
you immediately that somebody has a federally registered trademark, so you don't use it,
right? But let's say you wanted to use Apple for, um, uh, let's say ranges like stoves.
Okay. It's like you have this brand instead of biking, you want to call it Apple. All
right. Well, they don't have a stove line. So you might look for the international class
that's associated with stoves and see whether or not Apple is registered in there. And that
gives you an idea of whether or not you can use it or not. And once you get that information,
again, you gather that information and you give that to your attorney, you're cutting
down your costs by like three quarters, maybe even decreasing it by a third, sometimes half
as much in expense because you came prepared to your attorney. So it's really beneficial
to understand the international class. And tonight, before I leave here, I'm going to
drop a link for you where you can literally just go down the list and see where your goods
are or where your services are and see that's my international class. Now you can come into
this website and type in the international class and the word you want to search and
boom, you should be able to determine whether or not, um, it should be canceled immediately.
If it's not a canceled immediately, then you take those ones that look the best and you bring
those to your attorney to do a double check on stuff, but you don't go to them with 10 different
names because you're going to spend so much money. And I'd much rather you don't waste money
when you don't have to. Okay. Is this helping you guys? The trademark search helping you guys?
Good. Um, yes, this stuff is not as complex as some of the stuff we covered yesterday.
Um, now when we go into VIP in about 10 minutes, we're going to go deeper. Like I'm going to show
you how to do logo searches. I'm going to show you how to, um, do some, do some other tricks
to the trade to make things much more efficient, but everybody at this point should be able to go
to USPTO and your homework assignment is go to USPTO.gov. Look up the name of your company or
look up the name of your product or services, do a quick search, see what's out there. And if you
see something that looks pretty close to you, you may have an issue. And I can tell you from
experience about 20% of the people that are in the training, find out right off the bat,
oh my gosh, I have a trademark infringement issue. Here's the beauty of it. You now know
something you didn't know before. So don't, so please don't freak out. I had one person,
this was kind of funny, uh, probably a third time I ran this, which was a while ago.
She came to me and said, I've got like 14 different trademarks and like half of them
are infringing upon other people's trademarks. I said, well, at least now, you know, so you can
phase out certain things and you can modify things. At least you haven't been sued. So it's better to
know these things now. And then on top of that, if you're building a company, how awesome is it
that now you know how to determine whether or not the name that you're thinking of using is safe to
use? That's so important. You want to know if it's safe because if it is safe, awesome. Let's spend
all our money on our websites, on our, you know, our product packaging, our stationery, and we
don't have to worry about replacing it. Okay. All right. Let me take one more question and then
we're going to end for today. Oh yeah. Thanks for dropping that rate. If anybody's not on VIP and
you want to jump in, jump in guys. Um, because, uh, well after Wednesday, we don't let anybody
else into VIP because, um, it just gets too busy. Um, so we allow it kind of early, early in the
game. All right. I will see if anybody has a question. Just raise your virtual hand. Sonia.
Sonia's first. So you're in VIP, right? You are. Okay. Is anybody who's not in VIP?
Because I'm going to answer Sonia's question right away. So, uh, let's see.
We're getting some questions here in the chat. All right. Let me see, Sean. Um, let me see.
All right. Alicia, go ahead.
So I have a question.
I have a website called gospel vocalist.com.
It's called what?
Gospel vocalist.com, but it's one word.
Is that going to matter in the search?
I just used one word, and it came clear.
But is it wise to do the word separately as well?
That's a great question.
That's a really good question.
When you're doing your trademark searches,
I would search for each word separately.
That's what I would do, all right?
But what I would do is I would try to figure out
what's the international class associated
with my goods or services,
which I'm going to help you all out tonight.
I'm going to do two things for you guys tonight.
I'm going to drop the link,
and I'm going to do a live in the Facebook group
to give you guys a bonus, all right?
Just so you understand how to look this up,
I'm going to do it live so you guys can see it, okay?
I just want to make sure you guys get this.
It's a really cool tool to have.
If you know how to do this,
you will save so much time and money.
It's just so helpful.
So if you know the international class, right?
Let's say it's 41, and it's, what is it, gospel what?
Gospel vocalist.
And is it a group for gospel vocalists?
No, no, it's a service.
I write, I sing, I speak.
Okay, all right.
Just remember that thing I taught you about.
Sure, sure.
Just remember that thing I taught you about descriptiveness.
Just make sure it's not descriptive,
you know, if you're going for trademarks.
So would somebody use, like I'm not, this is not,
man, I almost went through an entire,
I almost went through an entire session without doing this.
I am amazing.
I'm so dehydrated this day.
I almost, yeah, I'm like, why are my lips parched?
I do not understand.
Why are my lips parched?
Now I understand.
Okay, thank you, Alicia, for keeping me hydrated.
This is not legal advice, okay?
I have said my piece here.
All right.
If something is descriptive, right?
If something is descriptive,
I personally would not use it.
The reason why is because,
and I'm not saying that's your situation, Alicia,
I'm just saying in general, right?
The reason why is because I'm gonna spend a lot of time
and money building up a market, all right?
I'm gonna get people to know my product
or my service very well,
and they're gonna identify it by the name.
That's how they're gonna know.
They're gonna know the name.
They're gonna hear the name and they're gonna go,
oh, that's the Protector Idea Challenge.
Oh man, dude, did you hear
about the Protector Idea Challenge?
You should join that, right?
And so because of that name is so important,
or like the Protection Portal,
do you hear about the Protection Portal?
You guys don't know about that.
You'll find out about that on Thursday.
So, you know, when you hear the name,
people are like, oh, I'm in the portal.
Like people literally, in some of the groups
that we are hanging out in a lot,
they'll literally say, I'm in the portal.
Like that kind of takes care of a certain thing
that's in their business, right?
So the name is so important.
Now, if I said, instead of calling it
the Protector Idea Challenge,
I called it the Teach You About IP Challenge.
I can't get a photo registration on that
in International Class 41
because I'm teaching you about ID.
So I can't get that name.
Now, what if I spent thousands of dollars
running ads under that name?
Some of you came here because of a Facebook ad.
How many people, just for my own knowledge,
how many people here came in from a Facebook ad?
Awesome.
So I can see that it is making sense.
It works.
Good.
I'm glad it works.
Because it's hard for me to get out there
and talk to everybody when I'm running a law firm, okay?
So I'm glad the ads work.
So the point being, I spend like, you know,
thousands of dollars to get people to understand
what is going on through ads, right?
Using what?
Protect Your Idea Challenge, right?
So if I had instead the Teach You IP Challenge,
then anybody could use that name.
Anybody could go out there and use that name.
Separate from that, I could never own it.
So the problem with that is that
now all of a sudden Alicia says, you know,
hey, I like that name.
I'm gonna start using it.
And then, you know, other people are using it
and Larissa does.
And Ray says, forget you, Peter.
I've been working for you for a year.
I'm done with you.
I'm gonna start my own business.
I'm gonna call it the Protect Your Idea Challenge,
you know, or whatever it is.
I can't stop these people, right?
Protect Your Idea Challenge is definitely protectable.
Teach you IP challenge is not protectable.
You see, that's why you gotta find out
whether or not it's descriptive.
And if it is descriptive, stop, do yourself a favor
because all the money that you're spending
on building up a brand, anybody will be able to step in
and take market share without you being able to do anything
because nobody's gonna come out there
and try to enforce a descriptive mark.
So, does that help?
I know your question is very specific on your name.
Yeah, it helps.
It sounds like I'm in trouble.
Yes, thank you.
I'm just throwing hints out there, sister.
Just throwing hints.
We're like, just a hint, just a hint, hint.
This is not legal advice.
I am just, I'm just speaking into the atmosphere.
Oh, look, there's a moth.
Hey, moth, did you know that there might be
descriptive terms mentioned every once in a while?
Yeah, that's just randomly speaking out loud.
That's all it is.
Just be careful.
And I'm telling you guys this because I care about you.
I want you guys to be successful.
And quite frankly, your name is very important.
You may not believe your name is important,
but I'm telling you, your name is probably
one of the most important things that's out there.
As an attorney, I do not sign a document with my name
unless I am 100% behind it.
I have driven lawyers crazy.
When they come over to me and say,
will you sign the document?
I say, no, I have to read the document.
And they say, well, I've reviewed it and I work for you.
I say, that's great.
I'm glad you work for me,
but I need to review the document before my name is on there.
Because when my name is on there, it's very important.
So just make sure that your name for your company,
your products, your services is safe.
And now you know how to do a good trademark search.
Go home, do searches, please.
The reason why I want you to do this
is because then you can go live in the Facebook group
and say, hey, this worked.
I didn't know I could do that.
This is great.
Or you might say, I don't understand this little thing.
What does this mean?
And then maybe we can do something to help you out.
Because I really want you guys to do well, okay?
All right, I'm gonna end there.
We went over, surprise, surprise.
We went over a little.
We're gonna take a eight minute break.
I'm gonna let Larissa close up with all of you.
Take an eight minute break.
At 8.30, we will jump into VIP, okay?
You and me and VIP, I will see you there.
Tee hee hee.
All right, I'll catch you guys later.
Bless you guys.
I'll see you, have a good night.