Question for a trademark person...

In My Humble Opinion
1

Hi, I have a super-specific question I’m hoping a trademark person can help me with.

I had a trademark, and I inadvertently allowed it to expire.

I filed a new application for the trademark and a “petition for special handling” form.

However, the petition was denied because the goods and services description was different between the cancelled mark and the new mark.

This is for the trademark LifeOnRecord.

The description on the cancelled mark is:

Audio [and video] recordings featuring the voices and/or images of people contributing to individual and event-based journals and diaries.

The description on the new application was basically the same, but I removed the brackets:

*Audio and video recordings featuring the voices and/or images of people contributing to individual and event-based journals and diaries. *

I guess the brackets means it was deleted? So in order to make it identical, does the new description need to be the following?
*
Audio recordings featuring the voices and/or images of people contributing to individual and event-based journals and diaries. *

I understand you are not my lawyer, etc.

Thank you.

2

Your *registration *expired, not your trademark.

3

Some reason you don’t want the brackets back in? Just wondering, I never cared for brackets all the much either.

Tris

Take that! Wait, don’t take that! Take something else.

4

[Moderating]

This looks like a request for legal advice, which therefore belongs in the IMHO forum, not GQ. Moving.

5

Now that I’m thinking about it, maybe the brackets need to be back in?

For the form that I am filing, one of the requirements is, “The goods/services of the collective membership organization in the new application is identical to, or narrower than, the goods/services of the collective membership organization in the cancelled or expired registration.”

I guess I was originally thinking I should try and “clean up” the brackets, but if it is supposed to be identical, maybe I need to leave the brackets in, and make it:

Audio [and video] recordings featuring the voices and/or images of people contributing to individual and event-based journals and diaries.

Does that sound right?