Dell 'Cloud Computing' trademark rejected

Sam Johnston, a bloke who's been following this on his blog, turned up the USPTO's rejection notice on its website.

A massive PDF file available there says that the USPTO has refused Dell's application in a "non-final" action for two reasons.

First, because "the applied-for mark merely describes a feature and characteristic of applicant's services."

Secondly, because "Cloud Computing" is merely a generic industry term that is "incapable of functioning as a source-identifier for applicant's services."

But what's truly astonishing is that it took the USPTO bureaucracy nearly eighteen months to slap down Dell's attempt to trademark this common computing industry buzzword term.

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