Intel owns Inside (true)

Intel's fearless intellectual property lawyers have wrested the word 'inside' from a rival US firm, after an epic battle.

The heroes in suits successfully completed a dawn raid on Town Graphics, a small mapmaker based in Woodinville, Washington state. No casualties are reported.

It's a different story at Town Graphics. The company printed a map and stuffed copies into envelopes carrying the legend "map inside". It sent these out in mailshot. So far, so ordinary. Then it tried to trademark the expression 'map inside'. Big mistake.

Intel sent the attack dogs in, offering 'just over £400", according to the Mail on Sunday (i.e c, $600) to Town Graphics to junk its trademark plans.

Larry Morris, owner of Town Graphics, is unhappy with the offer but doesn't fancy a fight with Intel, which says this is normal procedure to 'prevent dilution of our brand and trademarks'.

So does Intel own 'Inside'? Err, no. It owns Intel Inside and it would easily see off any attempts to establish a rival trademark using 'inside' in the computer sector. But maps and mailshots? It just goes to show a big warchest goes a long, long way.

In previous years Intel has tried to establish lasting trademarks for letters of the alphabet - "i" - and for numbers e.g. 486. Intel abandoned its numbering scheme for processors, adopting the Pentium name insteadfor what would have been the 586. The bid to appropriate a letter of the alphabet failed too. ®

the

You rang?

[I demand you cease and desist from all future use of "the". Ownership of copyright, and all rights of use of "the" are held Freeper Fixit. "the" is a registered trademark of Freeper Fixit, and Freeper Fixit also holds, claims, and protects other intellectual property and trade secrets in the use, formulation, production, application and exploitation of "the."
Please sign and return the enclosed affadavit assuring Fixit of your deletion of all occurrences of "the" from your hard drive. Also, you must insure that at all future times you cease and desist from infringing Fixit's intellectual property by using "the" in any un-licensed and/or trademark diluting fashion. Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.]

See: Trademark Anti-Dilution Laws as Cultural Censorship

Mercedes 190 220 230 280 300 320 400 420 500 600

Lexus 300 400 450

BMW 318 320 323 325 328 330 525 528 530 535 540 635 735 740 750 840 850

Chrysler 300

On behalf of my client, please be advised that it is our opinion that your claims do not meet the appropriate legal standard for trademark infringement. Specifically, plaintiff must show evidence of the likelihood of actual confusion on the part of consumers - we do not believe this to be the case, as the geographic separation of, and disparate goods provided by, claimant and my clients renders any possible confusion exceedingly unlikely. Second, "Fixit" has failed to develop a protectable trademark right in a trademark of the word "the". Thirdly, even if such confusion exists and Fixit has a protectable trademark right, claimant is wholly unable to make any showing of intent to infringe on the part of my clients.

In the future, all communication to my clients may be directed to me as their duly designated representative.

Sincerely,
Leonard J. Krabs
Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe

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