I want to talk briefly about the role of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) once you have a registered trademark. A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine obtained a registered trademark (not through me for which we shall have words). While doing...
When an examining attorney is reviewing a trademark application at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), they must determine whether or not a trademark application should be moving forward. The examination process is as much an art as it is a science. But, let’s...
I have three core reasons why I only represent small business owners. Small businesses are both the heart and soul of any town, city, state, and the country. Small businesses create more jobs, better lifestyles, and better communities than anyone else. Small business owners have...
A couple of days ago I met with a client who is dealing with some changes to her employee manual. This is a creative firm and one the questions she had was: what are the intersections between non-compete agreements and freelance work by her creative...
Here is another geeky contract term that a lot of people don’t understand, yet it has important implications if there is ever a dispute between the parties to a contract. The geeky contract term for this week is the Integration Clause. The Integration Clause (or...
Today, I want to talk about geeky contract terms that people often ignore: Governing Law, Jurisdiction, and Venue. These terms usually appear in the boilerplate of a contract, and I group these three subjects together because they revolve around one similar concept: What are going...
Whether you think so or not, your contract is as much a part of your customer's experience as your first sales call or your last wrap-up meeting. Too often, companies that restructure and reorganize to focus on customer experience fail to think about the written...
Here is the slide deck from my latest presentation for the Maryland Small Business Development Center on the subject of Building Better Contracts. I tend to look first to the relationship between the contract parties before I start looking at the transaction details. If you would...
Never let anyone tell you that a contract is so different from other written communications that you should not do an audience analysis before drafting the contract. The contract communicates ideas and before communicating ideas you should have a solid understanding of who receives the ideas...