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TM Trademarks are not so worrisome. These are "unregistered
trademarks". You can at any time create a trademark and use it
on a product. It can also be applied for to the patent office to be
a "registered trademark". This requires evidence of
commercial use (e.g., labels, advertisements, etc), and that it doesn't
conflict with any other registered trademark, and fees and maintenance
are required. If granted, one can then use the R with a circle
around it. It is illegal to use this symbol unless granted (whereas
anyone can use "TM"). This registered mark prevents
someone else from using it or something similar to label a commercial
product with. The "TM" doesn't therefore carry very much
weight. Even if some company registers "protein
Tomography" or something similar, it doesn't prevent anyone else
from using the term; they just can't sell another product with that
name. Take "Apple" for example. That's registered,
but people still write about apples. But you can't sell another
computer marked "Apple". (You could however sell apples
with the TM of "Apple"; the rule is that it can't confuse the
buyer). If they just use TM, forget about any conflicts.
Legally, if they are granted a registered trademark, then it just means
you can't market a similar product with that name, but you can use the
name. Nanoprobes registered the name "Nanogold" but I see
a lot of uses by nanotechnology people just referring to other small gold
materials. Maybe all that means is a little bit of confusion or
free advertising. Hope this helps clarify the issue.<br>
Best regards,<br>
Jim Hainfeld<br>
President, Nanoprobes, Inc.<br><br>
At 01:30 PM 12/12/2005, you wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">**** Messages to this list are
automatically archived ***<br>
**** Please limit quoting of previous postings to the bare minimum
****<br><br>
The term shows up in the legend to the figure accompanying the
article. The words "Protein Tomography" have
"TM" as a subscript.<br><br>
--Joachim.<br><br>
At 12:29 PM 12/12/2005, michael wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">Is it really true that the term
"Protein Tomography" was trademarked? Or did Sidec only apply
for a trademark? I cannot really believe that a scientific term can be
trademarked.<br><br>
Regards<br>
Michael Schatz<br>
Image Science<br><br>
<br><br>
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<x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
Dr. James F. Hainfeld * hainfeld@bnl.gov<br>
Brookhaven National Laboratory * Biology Dept. *
Bldg. 463 * Upton, NY 11973 USA<br>
Tel. 631-344-3372 * Fax. 631-344-3407<br>
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