Intellectual Property Law Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 2

Intellectual Property Law - Essay Example demarks whereby trademark registration acted to indicate a product’s origin or identity, while also protecting the mark from use by other traders apart from the one who registered the mark2. This solved problems that had arisen regarding showing ownership to the mark through the establishment of goodwill necessary for pass-off action. The trademark directive finally got implementation into law with 1994’s Trade Mark Act (TMA) that holds to date. It states that the proprietor of a trademark that has been registered possesses exclusive rights that are infringed upon through the use of the trade mark without their consent in the UK3. The TMA sought to widen the infringement of trademark scope through allowing traders to register any sign that could be graphically represented and capable of distinguishing one’s undertaking from another traders undertaking4. With the advent of the Trade Marks Act 1994, it has been suggested that the common law tort of passing off has become largely superfluous in the protection of identifying insignia. This paper will seek to show that this is not eh case, especially since it still acts as a fallback option when the TMA faces l imitations, while it also fills the gaps in TMA section 10. One of the reasons why the TMA has been seen to render passing-off as superfluous in protection of identifying insignia, is that it has given a broader definition to what a trademark that can be registered constitutes. This in effect has allowed the registration of most things that can be used as a distinguishing element during passing off5. However, the expanded definition provided by the TMA do not render passing off completely superfluous in English law. This is especially since it is still the main action cause for those who, for one reason or another, do not register their trademarks, as well as for those marks that are non-registerable because of the limitations of TMA. In addition, even though the TMA extends the protection scope for