Judged Newsletter

Sign Up for THE DAILY JUDGED VERDICT. Our daily newsletter covers law firm salaries and everything you want to know about changes affecting law firms from people in the know. Sign Up Now!


Dear Judged > Archive





Dear Judged
Copywriting A CatchphraseWhat is the procedure for patenting a phrase?  I’m thinking about coining “going matriarchal,” the unlikely successor to “going postal.”  

Let’s face it—mothers are to the 21st century what post-office workers were to the 20th: blathering insane, to wit.
 Can we recap?  There’s the Texas mother who allegedly tried to incinerate her children (the latest in a whole crop of Texas “matriarchals” who have tried to hang, drown, shoot, and otherwise eradicate their progeny), the Florida mother who urged her daughter to retaliate against the 10-year-old who had bitch slapped the daughter the day before, the Maryland mother who harbored fetal remains from earlier miscarriages (no doubt good conversation pieces in case company should drop by), and, of course, Ms. Spears, who pantyless midnight romps hardly bear discussion… 

Who am I kidding?  Of course they do!  The latest antic, as I’m sure you know, is the Chateau Marmont episode in which Mommy Dearest saw fit to smear her face with food, prompting other patrons to request her removal.  Good luck there.  I tried to request her removal in 1998, and all I got was a restraining order.  Hit me baby one more time indeed.
 

Also, do you think I have a good chance of getting my patent accepted?  Unlike such bogus catchphrases as Trump’s “You’re fired” or Hilton’s “That’s hot,” the merits of “going matriarchal” are numerous and widely applicable. Why leave language suffering in the dusty annals of 18th century prescriptivism, eh Judge?  “Going matriarchal”—the ne plus ultra axiom.    
 

You heard it here first.
 

Tally ho! 
 

Not a girl, not yet a woman


Not Yet A Girl, Not
posted 2007-09-24 17:10:41


Dear MommaLaw,

Dear Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman, 

Wow, now this is a loaded question.  Doth I detect a bit of not-so-subtle residual hostility toward your own mother?  No doubt, but I’ll save the ‘psycho’ analysis for later.
 

The thing you need to know is that copyrighting is an unsavory business, as fickle and unpredictable as an extra-marital affair (just ask Charlie Sheen).  You might think that your own ideas and creations would belong solely to you, but with six billion other co-habitants vying for profit – or a spot on a Forbes List—chances are you’ll confront someone at some point who says your ideas are, well, theirs.  
 

Names, images, sounds, words, etc. tend to fall into the legal arena of ‘grey’ where things are not so starkly black and white (unlike, say, the panel of ‘The View’).  For the most part, when you create something it remains your own and no copyright is necessary.  If what you’ve made becomes designated for public consumption, however, then you need to copyright it and aggressively and actively protect it from infringement.  Public battles over copyrights can be good for business: everyone from The Beatles to Walt Disney to Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling have found themselves involved in nasty legal fights over the right to certain terms and expressions, which can both fuel and fatigue public interest.  It must be said that some phrases are best let go: I mean, how much cringing and teeth-gashing has “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” caused?  
 

But when it comes to copyrighting everyday, verbal phrases, then we get into even murkier territory.  We can all go around saying idiotic things like “That’s hot!” referring to either soap stars or Thai food, but if someone actually goes out and applies for a trademark—like Paris Hilton did— then we are not allowed to profit from any product using the phrase, though we may still certainly use, abuse, and mock it, as Hallmark did in its recent Paris's First Day as a Waitress card series (“Watch out, that plate of Schezwan is, like, hot!”) for which Ms. Hilton sued the greeting card giant (for the record, parody does not infringe on copyright- remember Al Franken vs. Faux(Fox) News?).  It seems that millionaire heiresses and right wing propaganda media machines are not immune from litigious-wretch syndrome.
 

And who can forget the ludicrous and contemptible lawsuit brought by America’s reigning Douche Bag and Misogynist-In-Chief, Donald Trump, against the plethora of independent pottery-and-fire businesses across the nation named “You’re Fired!” which the Dump Truck (copyright Rosie O'Donnell) happened to make into a popular catchphrase on his now defunct reality series.  
 

It just so happens that the most prominent owner of these small pottery shops, Susan Brenner, resides in the same community yours truly grew up in, her business being located right down the street from my parents’ home in Glenview, IL.  Brenner is the most aggressive and defiant of the business owners Trump has confronted, refusing to relinquish her hold on the trademark she had applied for and held since 1997.  She did neglect to pay the renewal fee which became an issue when Trump—while neglecting the family of red squirrels dwelling on his head—decided to market his phrase on merchandise like t-shirts and coffee mugs, in turn begging the question: what kind of billionaire shills off of trinkets you can only buy at the NBC store in Rockefeller Center?  Oh yeah, this is the same ‘billionaire’ who hawks steaks on QVC . . . 

 
For your own education, and for that of other woefully ill-informed halfwit “billionaires”, the phrase “You’re Fired” is a centuries-old, non-generic term deriving from the feudal age in Mendip, England and appears in its original legal form as the following: 

[i]f any man... do pick or steale any lead or ore to the value of XIIID, the Lord or his Officer may arrest all his lead and ore House or hearthes with his Grooves and Workes and keep them in forfeit... and shall take the person that hath soe affeended and bring him where his house or worke and all his tooles and instruments are... and put him into his house or worke and set fire in all together about him and banish him
 

Basically, it says that any man convicted of stealing lead or ore from his Lord or Officer shall be dealt with by being placed inside his home and his house set afire . . . I’m guessing feudal England offered few unemployment benefits.  

 
Ultimately, it all boils down to the double prong of celebrity and profit: local business owners can benefit from a long-standing pun name for businesses, but they face a tough challenge against national business conglomerates— courts will usually side the party who stands to profit most (hey, this is America).  But score one for the little guy: a court upheld Brenner’s right to her trademark in its original local vicinity, while the Dump known as Trump is free to profit from bobble heads and magnetic pins  . . . and the exploitation of young women in his never-ending series of international beauty pageants.  Which other industry is going to produce his future ex-wives?   

If only his mother had gone “matriarchal” on him . . . sigh . . . 
 

The Judge

Top Performing Jobs
Associate Attorney

USA-PA-Exton

ASSOCIATE ATTORNEY McKenna Snyder LLC, a law firm in Exton, PA has an immedia...

Apply Now
Attorney

USA-MI-Sturgis

Qualifications: HaasCaywood is seeking associate attorneys for our Coldwater ...

Apply Now
Attorney

USA-MI-Coldwater

Qualifications: HaasCaywood is seeking associate attorneys for our Coldwater ...

Apply Now
JDJournal - Send Tips
Education Law Attorney

USA-CA-El Segundo

El Segundo office of a BCG Attorney Search Top Ranked Law Firm seeks an educatio...

Apply Now
Education Law Attorney

USA-CA-Carlsbad

Carlsbad office of a BCG Attorney Search Top Ranked Law Firm seeks an education ...

Apply Now
Education Law and Public Entity Attorney

USA-CA-El Segundo

El Segundo office of a BCG Attorney Search Top Ranked Law Firm seeks an educatio...

Apply Now
Dear Judged


Dear Your Honor,
Dear Judge,

Do you ever experience any physical danger in the courtroom?  You do deal with all those criminals, right? 

Sincerly,

Concerned Bailiff's Mommy



+ more Judged Dear
+ write to Your Honor
Law Firm NewsMakers


1.
News Corp. Considers Splitting

LawCrossing

The Attorney Profile column is sponsored by LawCrossing, America`s leading legal job site.

Summary: This is a great question. There are many factors that impact a candidate’s ability to lateral from an overseas law firm to a top U.S. law firm.
Search Jobs Direct from Employer Career Pages
 Keywords:
 Location:
 
JDJournal

Enter your email address and start getting breaking law firm and legal news right now!



Every Alert

Alert once a day

 

BCG Attorney Search

You may search for specific jobs or browse our job listings.

Locations:

(hold down ctrl to choose multiple)

Minimum Years of Experience:

Primary Area of Practice:

 Partner Level Job(s)

Search Now