The Rom trademark saga continues

The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) has updated half of Hasbro's trademark claims, namely those for just the "Rom" mark, with Hasbro's response. Sadly, the ones for "Rom the Spaceknight," which were the ones initially refused in part because of Marvel's "Spaceknights" trademark, have not been updated at this time. I would ascribe this to delays on the USPTO's part in updating their databases, not Hasbro's in responding, but that's only a guess.

In essence, Hasbro's lawyers did three things for each application. First, they disclaimed any relation to Rom and computer memory, essentially saying that their product is not called Rom because it contains Read Only Memory computer chips. Second, they narrowed the classifications on each one to show that their products would not conflict with those of other companies that already have related trademarks. And third, they reiterated that the applications were for "intent to use" and that "at this time [Hasbro] has not yet developed specific, detailed factual plans for the goods/services" (where it's "goods" or "services" depending on the application in question).

Despite their supposed lack of detailed plans, the new classifications give us a much better idea of Hasbro's potential plans for Rom: market the stew out of him. The new classifications include action figures and vehicles(!), playsets, plush toys, stuffed toys, ride-on toys, building toys, inflatable toys, water squirting toys, board games, card games, electronic hand-held games, and jigsaw puzzles. And that's just the toys and games application. Then we have computer games, video games, gambling machines(!), movies, television shows, DVDs, and soundtrack albums spread across two more applications. And finally, we have just about every paper good and office supply imaginable: coloring books, story books, fiction books, party supplies, wrapping paper, trading cards, lunch bags, book covers, posters, pens, pencils, stationery, rulers, and temporary tattoos. In essence, think of all the common Star Wars products created in 30+ years. Hasbro wants to leave the door open to make those for Rom.

There's one, however that may bite them in the butt: comic books. Fine for the plain "Rom" applications, but if they include that in the "Rom the Spaceknight" ones, they'll run smack into Marvel's "Spaceknights" trademark. This is the response I anxiously await to read. And after I do, I'll let you know about it here.

[Next trademark update]

Hannah update: 9 months

By popular demand, Hannah updates are back. In short, she's doing great. She's running small on most measurements, particularly weight, but developmentally she's exactly where she should be, if not ahead. For the record, the measurements were 27.75" long and weighs 15 lbs. 2 oz.

She's dangerously close to walking. She can walk as long as bigger person holds her up or she can cruise holding on to furniture. In fact, she seems to prefer cruising to crawling. I fully expect her to be walking before 12 months.


She also has gotten her first two teeth. They're the two bottom ones. Hopefully you can make them out in the adjacent picture. She was starting to eat solid food even before the first tooth came in, but still gets plenty of mom's milk, too.

We had a scare over the weekend. Hannah spilled a container full of paper clips. Dorothy thought she had picked them all up, but then Hannah found another one, which Dorothy got away from her. Then, just a bit later, Dorothy thought she saw Hannah put something in her mouth. She checked and couldn't find anything, so she thought maybe she'd imagined it. Just a few minutes later, though, Hannah started choking. She spit up a bit of food and seemed to be fine, but that was scary enough that we took her to the pediatric ER.


It turns out they make teeny little hospital gowns for babies, as seen here. There was a bit of a wait, but it wasn't too bad, and much more pleasurable than going to the regular ER. Finally, we got an x-ray technician who loaded Dorothy and me up with lead smocks, as it was our job to hold her still during the procedure. We had to remove Hannah's cloth diaper, because of the snaps on it. The technician then seemed way too concerned about exposing her privates during the procedure. I mean, give me a break, she's just nine months old and the only people there were him and the three of us!

After another wait, we got the good news that nothing was found in the x-ray. So one $175(!) co-pay later, we were free to go. The cost made us feel a bit silly about the whole thing, but really, the peace of mind is priceless.

In other family news, our church had its music camp a few weeks ago. It was the story of the apostle Paul. Walter played the part of Peter. His main job was to do roll call for the rest of the apostles, which he did well. Andrew—seen here with his friend, Andrew—was in the sailor chorus, but also got to "stone" Stephen, which is what the costume he's wearing in the photo was for.

Found needed 2600 cart for -$1

It hasn't happened in a long time, but today I got a 2600 cartridge I didn't have before: Pete Rose Baseball. Unfortunately, this wasn't a quarter find at a garage sale or flea market, but when you've got as many 2600 games as I do (about 300), you'll take about anything new. And in reality, I actually made money on the deal. Well, sort of.

You see, a few weeks ago I found out via Craigslist that there was a new used game shop in town. It deals exclusively in consoles older than current. That is, everything that's not Wii, PS3, or Xbox 360. They've got PONG consoles on their shelves, for Winslow's sake! While I never completely lost interest, collecting video games has been on the back burner with me for a long time. Finding this store, however, has got me interested again.

My interest was mildly renewed upon finding another used game store a few months ago. But this newest store is an improvement over that one in two ways. First, while the other does have some 2600- and NES-era games, the selection is very limited. Second, it's closer. :-) And in general, it's just nice to have a couple non-GameStop video game stores in town.

So, getting back to the point. My trade bait is an absolute mess. I came to realize I've go to pare things down a bit a while back, but haven't done much towards that yet. One of the things I acquired that's got to go are some used Genesis games I'm not really interested in from the local Freecycle group. Those were handy, so today I took them down. There was a couple versions of Street Fighter II, Primal Rage, and some sports games. Unsuprisingly, they only offer $0.50 for sports games, so I wound up with a grand total of $5 for them.

Checking the 2600 games, however, I discovered the Pete Rose Baseball. A game I actually needed! Although worth more, it was $3.99, so she gave me the game and $1. All for a bunch of carts I got for free. So I guess that's:

1) Troll for games on Freecycle.
2) Trade them in.
3) Profit!

Old photo of Douglas Adams, insane resolution

If you hadn't heard, Jason Scott of textfiles.com is working on a text adventure documentary called "Get Lamp." His latest update mentions the PR photo of Douglas Adams and Steve Meretzky that made the rounds back when the Infocom Hitchhiker's game was released. Scott got to scan an original slide of the photo and has now made it available at 8760 x 6010! Go to the previous link for the blog entry, which gives a bit of context, then click on the photo there for the Flickr link.

Hasbro's Rom trademarks refused, but it's not over

Obligatory disclaimer: I am not a lawyer! So take anything I say about trademarks with the grain of salt.

In checking on the status of Hasbro's trademark applications for "Rom" and "Rom the Spaceknight," I learned a little bit more about just what information the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has available throughout the registration process. It turns out that the USPTO had issues with every single one of Hasbro's applications. Letters were sent in January and Hasbro was given six months to respond. So we might know something by July 21!

While we're waiting, I thought I'd explain briefly the problems with the filings. First, in every single case Hasbro was told the classification they requested was too broad. Hasbro's lawyer(s) simply copied the description of the entire classes of goods they were applying for. The USPTO wants something more specific in each case. For example, rather than "games," they want something like "computer game consoles for use with an external display screen or monitor."

Second, all the trademarks for "Rom" were initially refused for being "merely descriptive." In other words, Hasbro can't trademark "Rom" for something involving "Read Only Memory" because it's a common descriptive term. Similarly, in all the "Rom the Spaceknight" applications, Hasbro was told they must disclaim the word "Rom" as part of the trademark. In other words, they can claim a specific, stylized logo including the word "Rom," but they can make no claim to the word itself. (I should point out that Hasbro did not submit any specific logos with their applications.) It turns out Casio already has a trademark on a "ROM" logo they use on memory cards for some electronic musical instruments, as seen below.

But the best refusal I've saved for last. Three of the four applications for "Rom the Spaceknight" were refused because of the registered trademark Marvel got for "Spaceknights" back in 2001! Yes, you read that right; Hasbro was refused because of Marvel's limited series featuring Rom's children. Oh, the irony! And unlike Parker Brothers/Hasbro, who let the original Rom trademark expire, Marvel applied for an extension in 2007, meaning Spaceknights should remain a registered trademark of Marvel until 2017, at which time they can apply for another ten-year extension.

Now as I said, Hasbro can refute the USPTO's refusals and answer their calls for clarification, but they're quickly running out of time. I don't know how much lag there is between the USPTO receiving materials and updating their database, but hopefully we'll see something by the end of next month. I promise you that once I know something, I'll share it.

[Next trademark update]