You risk forfeiting your domain name if you select one incompatible with any of the millions of existing commercial names. Suppose you’ve invested time, money, and effort in promoting your website and are forced to give up the domain name. In that case, your online business will likely experience a serious, if not deadly, hit. Contact the South Carolina trademark law firm to get help for your businesses.
Trademark law provides the guidelines for determining if a legal conflict is present. The fundamentals you must comprehend are as follows:
- Trademarks specify the origin of goods or products on the market.
- Federal and state laws safeguard witty, memorable, or provocative trademarks.
- Under federal and state law, expressive trademarks that have distinguished themselves via sales and advertising are secured.
- When the usage of both trademarks is probable to deceive customers about the goods or services or their source, the use of both trademarks is in legal conflict.
- The first commercial user of a trademark is its owner in the event of a legal dispute with a subsequent user.
- The subsequent user will likely have to discontinue using the mark if a legal issue is discovered, and they may even be required to pay the trademark owner compensation.
It leads to customer confusion:
Suppose the proprietor of an existing trademark persuades a judge or mediator that your use of the domain name increases the likelihood that buyers would be confused as to the origin or quality of the items. In that case, you risk losing your selected domain name.
Identical domain names can occasionally lead to people making unintended purchases of distinct goods or services.
Safeguarded Trademarks:
Only when a domain name that is identical to the one you intend to use is a registered trademark does customer misunderstanding matter. A trademark needs to stand out to be protected. A name may stand out because it is fictitious, random in its application, or evocative of the underlying commodity or service. Suppose a domain name contains surnames, place names, or common words that describe a feature of the goods or services sold on the website.
In that case, it is disqualified for trademark protection except if the owner can show distinction through effective advertising and sales. A name is undoubtedly distinctive if the trademark holder successfully registered it with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
How to avoid trouble:
To pick a domain name that meets your business requirements while avoiding infringing on anybody else’s trademark rights, check as many current trademarks as possible, look for any potential conflicts, and then choose a name that will not likely result in a nasty lawyer’s letter.
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s trademark database, located at www.uspto.gov, should be checked first for potential disputes. You can search this database to find all trademarks that have been registered, as well as all pending registrations. In addition to your proposed mark, you should look for other markings that are logically similar, such as substitutes and alternative spellings.
