Russian Hopes To Cash In On Emoticons 213
drewmoney writes "According to a BBC article, Entrepreneur Oleg Teterin said the trademark for the ';-)' emoticon was granted to him by Russia's federal patent agency. 'Legal use will be possible after buying an annual licence from us,' he was quoted by the newspaper Kommersant as saying. 'It won't cost that much — tens of thousands of dollars,' added the businessman, who is president of Superfone, a company that sells advertising on mobile phones. The president of Russian social networking site odnoklassniki.ru, Nikita Sherman said: 'You're not likely to find any retards in Russia who'll pay Superfone for the use of emoticons.'" Teterin may have gotten the idea by catching up on some old news about Despair, Inc., which in May 2000 was awarded a US trademark on the "frowny" emoticon (Slashdot story).
Its a PR Stunt, not about trademark (Score:5, Insightful)
The kind of person who would think of trademarking these symbols, would be a businessman who wanted to use this cheap stunt, to get a lot of publicity for his business. Its not about the trademark. Its a stunt, to generate free publicity for his business.
Re:"Entrepreneur"? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Patent Office == Zoo filled with Idiots? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Its a PR Stunt, not about trademark (Score:2, Insightful)
There is a saying that there's no such thing as bad publicity. This is wrong. Just ask Michael Jackson or OJ Simpson.
Who gives a flying f**k anyway? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Other Patent (Score:1, Insightful)
That appears to be an error in the HTML. If you view the no where in it does it state anything about font. [uspto.gov]