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CIPO Wares and Services Manual Contracts Again

In an update to this story, this morning CIPO announced its discovery that a number of the entries it added to the Wares and Services Manual as a result of Canada’s participation in the trademark identification harmonization project conducted by the Trilateral Partners do not comply with Canadian trademark requirements.

As such, the over 12,000 Trilateral-approved entries that were added to the Wares and Services Manual yesterday are being removed today.  CIPO has provided no official word on possible solutions, or a timetable for the (re)implementation of Trilateral-approved identification entries.

Bigger! Better! Wares and Services Manual Expands

After a long wait, Canadian practitioners were delighted to learn this morning that CIPO has finally approved and activated more than 12,000 new entries in the Wares and Services Manual.

By way of background, in 2009 CIPO signed a memorandum of co-operation with the United States Patent and Trademarks Office, the Japan Patent Office and the Office for the Harmonization of the Internal Market (responsible for overseeing the CTM system).  These entities – known as the Trilateral Partners – have worked in a loose association over the last few decades to promote and effect harmonization in their IP registration systems.

The Memorandum saw CIPO join the Trilateral Partners’ trademark identification project: the Partners maintain a list of identifications of goods and services that, if entered in an application for the registration of a trademark in any Partner country, will be accepted in that country.

As a condition of its accession to the Memorandum, Canada was permitted to assess the Trilateral list, and to reject a small percentage of identifications that it did not believe reflected Canadian requirements.  With today’s announcement, that process is now complete, and the acceptable terms have been added to the Wares and Services Manual.

PETA’s Use Of Canadian Club Trademark Gets Whacked

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is in the news again for its cheeky ad campaigns, which sometimes use well known trademarks of other parties to garner exposure for its views on Canada’s seal hunt.  We previously blogged about the use by PETA of an ad featuring the 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games mascots. 

A recent Globe & Mail article reports that PETA had been distributing postcards in a number of bars in Toronto, with plans to roll out the campaign across the country.  The postcards pictured on one side, a cartoon featuring a seal sitting at a bar and asking  the bartender for “Anything but a Canadian Club”.  The other side of the postcard featured a photograph of a hunter about to club a seal.

The North American distributor of Canadian Club Whisky didn’t see the humour in PETA’s cartoon and sent a cease and desist letter, claiming that the publication had caused degradation of Canadian Club’s corporate image and damage to its brand and trademark.

In response to the demand letter PETA agreed not to send out more postcards and to remove the cartoon from its website.   Notwithstanding its compliance with the demand, a spokesperson for PETA argued that it had the doctrine of fair use on its side, to permit the use of trademarks for parody or satire.  Unfortunately for PETA, fair use is a U.S. doctrine that doesn’t apply in Canada in the context of either copyright or trademarks.

Keyword Advertising Appeal Discounts Trademark Analogies

Canada continues to await its first Court decision on the use of trademarks in keyword advertising.  The British Columbia Court of Appeal issued its decision this week in the case of Private Career Training Institutions Agency (the Agency)  v. Vancouver Career College (Burnaby) Inc. (VCC).  While the Trial Judge’s decision, that the use of keyword advertising in this case was not misleading in the context of the applicable Bylaw, was upheld, the reasoning of the Trial Judge, to the extent it relied on an analysis of confusion under trademark law, was overruled.

At issue was whether the use of keyword advertising by VCC, which is the operator of a private college, was offside the provisions of a Bylaw of the Agency, which is a regulatory body created by the Private Career Training Institutions Act of British Columbia.  The Bylaw in question states that an institution such as VCC “must not engage in advertising … that is false, deceptive or misleading.  Deceptive advertising includes but is not limited to an oral, written, internet, visual, descriptive or other representation that has the capability, tendency or effect of deceiving or misleading a consumer“.   The Agency went further and issued a guideline for interpretation of this Bylaw which specifically stated that keyword advertising and other similar practices would constitute false, deceptive or misleading activity. Read more

Trademark Summary Expungement Proceedings: Evidentiary Issues

In 1459243 Ontario Ltd. v. Eva Gabor International, Ltd., the Federal Court set aside the Registrar’s decision expunging a trademark under section 45 of the Trade-marks Act.  The parties agreed that the standard of review was one of correctness, unless new evidence would have materially affected the decision of the Registrar.  At issue was whether the new affidavit filed by the Applicant was hearsay and, if admissible, whether the evidence would have affected the Registrar’s decision.

The Applicant’s new affidavit sought to introduce evidence that employees of the company had included promotional flyers bearing the trademark at issue when shipping other goods to customers.  On cross-examination the deponent acknowledged he was not personally involved with the flyers.  The Federal Court concluded that this evidence met the criteria of reliability and necessity required by the Supreme Court of Canada decision, R. v. Smith, particularly in the context of section 45 proceedings which are intended to be expeditious and straightforward.  The Court noted that other cases had accepted the reliability of evidence given by individuals who operate businesses.  The evidence was also necessary since requiring evidence from several employees would not be consistent with the summary procedure intended for section 45 proceedings. Read more

Off-colour Trademark Decision Leaves Glaxo Purple With Frustration

In reasons issued late last year, the Federal Court of Appeal has upheld a decision to expunge a trademark registration obtained by Glaxo Group Limited (“Glaxo”) for two-tones of the colour purple as applied to the visible surface of an asthma inhaler. The decision raises interesting questions both about primary and secondary marks, and about the amount of evidence necessary to support a finding that a mark is distinctive.

Inhaler - Front ViewBy way of background, Glaxo registered its mark (depicted right, below) in May of 2007. A collection of generic drug manufacturers brought a Federal Court application to expunge the mark about 6 months later, alleging that the mark was not distinctive.

In its decision, the Federal Court concluded that for the mark to be distinctive the constituency of consumers for the inhaler (including physicians, pharmacists and patients) must relate the trade-mark to a single source, and thereby use the mark to make their prescribing, dispensingInhlaler - Top/Side View and purchasing choices. In market sectors where purchasing decisions are made by or on the advice of professionals, commercial distinctiveness of such marks will be inherently more difficult to establish: such persons will make purchasing or prescription decisions based on the specific properties of the product, and not on the packaging or marks associated with those products. Read more

Ontario Teachers Get A Lesson In Trademarks

The Federal Court of Canada has upheld a decision of the Registrar of Trademarks to refuse registration of the mark TEACHERS’ in association with services described as “administration of a pension plan, management and investment of a pension for teachers in Ontario”.  The application to register this mark was filed by the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board.

The Registrar had refused registration of this mark on the basis that it was clearly descriptive of the character of the claimed services, contrary to S. 12(1)(b) of the Trade-marks Act.   On appeal, the Federal Court agreed, finding that the word TEACHERS’ in its plural and possessive form, is a distinguishing feature, and therefore the character, of this pension plan because it is a pension plan for teachers.  It clearly describes a prominent characteristic of the wares or services provided.  According to the Court, providing the applicant with a monopoly on the use of this word would prevent other pension or financial services targeted to or belonging to teachers within Ontario or in other provinces and territories from using the term.