{"id":225,"date":"2017-04-07T12:29:09","date_gmt":"2017-04-07T16:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/?p=225"},"modified":"2017-04-11T13:03:08","modified_gmt":"2017-04-11T17:03:08","slug":"policing-the-trademark-playground-and-calling-out-bullies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/?p=225","title":{"rendered":"Policing the Trademark Playground and Calling Out Bullies"},"content":{"rendered":"

The prevailing defendant in Louis Vuitton v, My Other Bag, LLC (blogged about here: Louis Vuitton Left Holding the Bag<\/a>) in a Motion filed on April 7 in the Southern\u00a0District of New York\u00a0(Case 1:14-cv-03419-JMF Document 154) is seeking $802,939.05 in fees and costs for defending Louis Vuitton’s claim that MOB’s parody bag infringed or diluted Louis Vuitton’s rights:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

MOB argues that a fee award is justified because Louis Vuitton is a trademark bully.\u00a0 “Trademark bully” is a\u00a0term that is being used with increasing\u00a0frequency.\u00a0 See\u00a0Three Stripes and You’re Out<\/a>.\u00a0 MOB used the term “bully” at least 13 times in its motion for fees.<\/p>\n

Trademark Owners are put in a difficult position.\u00a0 The failure to aggressively enforce their rights, can\u00a0allow third party uses that either weaken the mark in a likelihood of confusion analysis, or lessen its fame and distinctiveness in a dilution\u00a0analysis.\u00a0 A trademark owner may (rightly) feel forced to take actions that it might otherwise be inclined to tolerate.\u00a0 And outside of the costs of enforcement, there has been\u00a0little consequence to bringing such a claim.<\/p>\n

An award of attorneys fees and costs\u00a0in appropriate cases, may be exactly what is needed to tip the scales when enforcement decisions are being made.\u00a0 It is up to the Southern District of New York to judge the propriety of Louis Vuitton’s enforcement efforts, and decide whether or not the name “bully” is appropriate.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The prevailing defendant in Louis Vuitton v, My Other Bag, LLC (blogged about here: Louis Vuitton Left Holding the Bag) in a Motion filed on April 7 in the Southern\u00a0District of New York\u00a0(Case 1:14-cv-03419-JMF Document 154) is seeking $802,939.05 in … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":231,"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions\/231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trademarks.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}