Deadspin jumps on the TCU Trademark Truthers bandwagon

LINK

There's a whole lot of laughs in here from my perspective but the biggest one is this.

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Intellectual property experts say getting exclusive rights to a slogan or a phrase is far more difficult than, say, getting a patent on a better mousetrap.

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It's pretty telling that while the story names two sources on legal matters, this one gets a vaguely passive "intellectual property experts say." Show me an attorney who practices both and thinks trademarks are harder, and I'll show you the world's worst patent attorney.

The prior art searches alone for patents are incredibly painstaking because you have to look for anything that was ever published, in any country, and if four different references disclose different components of the invention, you're hosed on obviousness. Trademarks you dick around for maybe an hour in the TESS search engine to make sure nothing is exactly like yours in a similar class of goods.

Another difference, and one relevant to this story, is that you don't have to be the originator of a trademarked phrase to register it. The article even says as much. But despite that admission, they keep the conspiratorial tone when talking about the origins of the mark before and after:

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In August, Daylon Mack talked about his introduction to #WRTS, and didn't claim it was his idea. In his telling, Mark Snyder—then A&M's defensive coordinator, now Michigan State's special teams coach—gets the credit for devising the popular hashtag. Mack said he first became aware of the tag on May 28, when Snyder used it in a tweet celebrating the signing of blue-chip quarterback prospect Kyler Murray.

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WHO CARES?

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On Dec. 2, Coris Mack's application to register the trademark was published for opposition by USPTO. That gave the public, including Texas A&M and its coaches, 30 days to challenge Coris Mack's right to own #WRTS.

A&M did nothing.

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BECAUSE THEY HAD NO GROUNDS TO OPPOSE IT!

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Beth Snyder says she only recently found out that somebody with A&M had trademarked the phrase. The informant was a family friend in College Station who was aware of the coach's role in making #WRTS a thing, and was bothered that somebody was trying to profit off her husband's serendipitous creation.

"He says, 'We really need to have a discussion about this!' and he's so serious that I laughed," she says. "And he's like, 'No, seriously! We need to talk!'"

That family friend is a lawyer, she says.

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WAS SNYDER MAKING SHIRTS? NO? THEN YOU GET NOTHING. YOU LOSE. GOOD DAY SIR.

To be clear, I don't for a second believe that any recruiting process involving a 5* athlete and multiple SEC/B12 programs is clean. But the idea that IP lawyers are the new bagmen is retarded. A&M is obliged to defend trademarks that they already have registered. But they're not required to register every hashtag Sumlin uses. If a recruit's family jumps on it, more power to them. Trademarks are cheap ($225 if you e-file TEAS PLUS) and so are T-shirts.