The parent company of LG Electronics filed two trademark applications last week in South Korea and the U.S. that appear to be the likely nomenclature for an upcoming white-glove service and maintenance program in support of LG's global OLED TV franchise, Patent and Trademark Office records showed. LG plans to use the trademarks LG OLED Care and LG OLED Care Program for services that include “monitoring” TV sets, including by “remote access,” said the Dec. 23 applications. LG didn’t comment Tuesday. LG faces potential OLED TV marketing differentiation challenges in 2021 with Samsung Display’s impending introduction of hybrid quantum dot-OLED panels for large-screen premium TVs (see 2011110002). QD-OLED is expected to have some of the same advantages as LG Display’s white OLED technology, plus the additional benefits of increased brightness and wider color gamut. Non-Samsung OLED TV brands may source QD-OLED panels from Samsung Display as leverage to win more favorable commercial terms from LG Display on white OLED, Display Supply Chain Consultants speculates.

Samsung Electronics in South Korea filed Oct. 5 in the U.S. and Sept. 25 in the EU to trademark a wordless logo that depicts an old console TV on legs, its Patent and Trademark Office application shows. Samsung describes the logo as a “rectangle shape in the style of a television with a leg on both sides.” It wants to possibly use it for a broad swath of consumer tech goods, said the application. Console TVs went out of favor by the early 2000s after the transition began from CRT to flat-panel sets in large screen sizes. Samsung didn’t respond to questions Friday.

Patent and Trademark Office veteran Shira Perlmutter will be register of copyrights and Copyright Office director, Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden announced Monday. Perlmutter will take over in late October as the 14th register. She vacates her role as PTO chief policy officer and international affairs director, positions she had since 2012. Perlmutter “brings to this role a deep knowledge of domestic and international copyright law and policy and a background in negotiating international intellectual property agreements,” Hayden said. “She has experience working with a wide range of stakeholders and finding common ground on complex issues.” The Senate won’t have to confirm Perlmutter. Senate and House Judiciary Committee leaders in 2017 considered making the register a presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed position with a 10-year term, but momentum slowed (see 1706090050). Maria Strong was acting register. At PTO, Perlmutter oversaw domestic and international IP policy and legislative engagement through the Office of Government Affairs. She was CO associate register-policy and international affairs in 1995. She previously was associate general counsel for IP policy at Time Warner and World Intellectual Property Organization copyright consultant. Perlmutter looks forward to “rejoining the dedicated staff of the Copyright Office on its mission of promoting the creation and dissemination of works of authorship.” NAB, Public Knowledge, the Computer & Communications Industry Association, Digital Media Association, RIAA, Motion Picture Alliance and Copyright Alliance welcomed the news. “The Copyright Office will now have new leadership at a time when updating its operations is more important than ever,” CCIA President Matt Schruers said. Copyright Alliance CEO Keith Kupferschmid described Perlmutter as a “proven leader and a beacon of knowledge and integrity within the intellectual property community for decades and will serve all stakeholders and users of the Copyright Office services well.” Perlmutter “consistently worked to promote understanding and progress in copyright law and has established herself as a preeminent authority,” said RIAA CEO Mitch Glazier. PK looks forward to working with Perlmutter to “protect and advance the rights of everyday users, fans, and consumers online,” said Senior Policy Counsel Meredith Rose.

Samsung applied July 6 to trademark two logos for initiatives it’s pursuing in residential and greenhouse LED lighting, Patent and Trademark records show. The logos' blue and white design elements are identical, except the one for “SAMSUNG HUMAN CENTRIC LED illuminated” depicts a human figure with arms raised, and the other, for "SAMSUNG HORTICULTURE LED illuminated,” shows two white leaves. Samsung introduced its “first family” of “human-centric” LED lighting components in mid-March, claiming they help the body “adjust melatonin levels indoors, making people feel more energetic or relaxed depending on their daily life patterns.” Its horticultural LEDs appear older. They're aimed at greenhouse and “vertical farming” lighting applications, and “provide a broader spectrum of light for healthier plant growth,” said the company in November 2018. Samsung didn’t comment Monday.

Samsung applied to register Galaxy BudsX April 27 as a trademark and service mark for a broad array of audio electronics goods, including headphones, said Patent and Trademark Office records. Online forums abuzz with speculation about Galaxy BudsX say Samsung is expected to introduce it as a new line of Bluetooth earbuds in 2020's second half or early in 2021. The company didn’t comment Monday.

A Patent and Trademark Office examining attorney erred last summer when she rejected the UHD Alliance’s application to register Filmmaker Mode as a certification mark on grounds that it’s “merely descriptive” of the TVs it’s meant to certify, responded the alliance Friday. The wording in the mark is “not inherently distinctive,” and is “unregistrable” under trademark law because it just describes “an ingredient, quality, characteristic, function, feature, purpose, or use of the goods applicant will certify,” wrote PTO attorney Catherine Caycedo Aug. 14. UHDA disagrees, because it takes “a leap of imagination to understand that the Mark identifies an ability of the viewer to watch (not make) video content in the original format it was created, without the embedded digital alterations that are a common feature of most products that allow the user to view content,” said the alliance. The mark “does not, and can not, identify anyone or anything that actually makes a film, which is the Examining Attorney’s primary argument,” it said. Filmmaker Mode “does not immediately convey any information about an ingredient, quality, characteristic, function, feature, purpose or use of its goods,” it said. “Consumers will have to exercise imagination or a leap of thought to determine what kind of product may bear the Mark and what the Mark actually signifies.” Case law supports the conclusion that “these are qualities inherent to a suggestive mark, not a descriptive one,” it said. It urged the attorney to withdraw her objections and approve the application for publication. UHDA bowed Filmmaker Mode Aug. 27 as the ease-of-access TV-picture setting free of the image processing that creators disdain for rendering content as if it were shot on high-speed video rather than film (see 1908270001). UHDA launched it with brand support from LG, Panasonic and Vizio, and added Kaleidescape, Samsung and TP Vision backing at CES (see 2001070034).

U.S. District Judge William Sessions in Burlington, Vermont, rejected Netflix's motion to dismiss publisher Chooseco's civil complaints about Choose Your Own Adventure in a Black Mirror episode (see 1901140004), according to a 30-page order (in Pacer) Tuesday. Netflix outside counsel didn't comment. Sessions said Chooseco showed consumers associate its mark with interactive books and that the mark covers other forms of interactive media.

The Patent and Trademark Office granted CTA its second deadline extension to file a statement of use (SOU) in its June 2018 application to trademark a certification logo for over-the-counter hearing aids (see 1806250018), agency records show. CTA created the logo to identify reputable OTC hearing aids for consumers with mild or moderate hearing loss that meet minimum performance specs in the ANSI/CTA-2051 standard approved in January 2017. PTO requires SOUs to prevent applicants from hoarding trademarks with no intention of using them in normal commerce. CTA is hamstrung from filing the SOU because it needs to await the FDA’s expected release by late summer of proposed rules establishing the OTC hearing-aid category under legislation President Donald Trump signed into law in August 2017 (see 2001170050). A trademark applicant is entitled to up to five SOU deadline extensions of six months each, but must file the SOU within three years after receiving PTO's notice of allowance (NOA) that clears the application for final approval. PTO issued CTA its hearing-aid NOA a year ago Wednesday.

Professional audio supplier Millennia Music & Media Systems applied to register the trademark HDR-A for use on equipment for the “recording, transmission, processing and reproduction of sound,” said Patent and Trademark Office records. HDR-A’s first use in commerce was “at least as early as” Sept. 3, the date of the application, said the records. “The mark consists of standard characters, without claim to any particular font style, size, or color,” said the application. It appears on the front panel of Millennia's HV-3C two-channel mic preamplifier to highlight the product’s high dynamic range audio functionality. Millennia founder John La Grou owns the HDR-A mark and filed the application without an attorney, said the PTO records Though most of the industry’s recent attention has turned to HDR video, HDR audio, the ratio between the loudest and the softest audible sounds on a recording, has been around for decades and reached mainstream popularity with the advent of the CD. La Grou won’t comment on HDR-A because it’s “a stealth technology” that Millennia hasn’t announced, he emailed us Saturday. “Probably 2Q20.” The HV-3C is a new “iteration of our famous HV-3 micamp, used to record more feature film scores and classical music recordings than any other microphone preamplifier over the last 25 years,” said La Grou. The HV-3, introduced in the early 1990s, was inducted this year into the National Association of Music Merchants Technical Hall of Fame, he said. Recent history shows PTO giving HDR trademark applicants a rough go even if they got agency approval. PTO killed Sony’s application to trademark an 8K HDR logo earlier this year after examiners twice refused it for being “merely descriptive” of Sony’s goods (see 1902040020). Dolby Labs twice failed to pass PTO examiners’ merely-descriptive tests on its JPEG-HDR trademark application. Dolby ultimately landed registration of the trademark after nearly two years of trying, and succeeded only after amending the application to suit PTO's objections.

Samsung applied last week in the U.S. and May 28 in the EU to register “The Wall Remote” as a “principal” trademark for “downloadable software” for controlling modular LED panels, said Patent and Trademark Office records. Samsung at CES introduced The Wall, a 219-inch modular microLED display “that offers flexibility in screen size, allowing users to customize it to fit any room or space,” said the company in Las Vegas. Samsung didn’t comment Friday on the trademark application.