What happens when you let bureaucrats make decisions about business?
A whole lotta nothing, that's what.

About two year ago we started the trademark process. Admittedly, the timing was weird. But at the time we applied (through a fancy New York lawyer), we were all under the impression that we waiting 15 days to "flatten the curve".

We were still in the phase of "Oh, this is nice. I can't even go anywhere even if they want me to." I thought I would use the time to catch up on our own business goals. These are often put to the side to serve a client or customer, but since all ours were forced to shut down, we had nothing to do but focus on ourselves.

So the fancy lawyer prepped the paperwork on our behalf and submitted it to the examiner. Months passed. Then a few more months. The world went to shit. Businesses closed. The clusterfuckery of the government was not apparent to all.

Still, we heard nothing apart from a couple of updates from the lawyer, and these seemed routine.

Then, the lawyer stopped answering my emails, then my phone calls. He told his secretary to lie to me. How do I know this? I don't have proof, but I know the voice of someone who has been asked to lie by their boss.

Something was not right.

Then I discovered that this fancy New York lawyer had gotten a cover article in a fancy New York music magazine for his work with some fancy big name musician in entertainment law. We had officially become small po-dunk potatoes.

I'll show him po-dunk.

I quickly filed a complaint with the New York appellate court for an ethics violation.

We got another lawyer. Turns out he is just the kind of insane we need for dealing with the USPTO. His stream of consciousness emails have headers. It's fun.

Anywho, this second lawyer specializes in trademarks. That's all he's done for 20+ years.

He sent me the posted images to make changes to our website on 'request' of the trademark examiner.

Just wrap your head around this - to be a marketer you have to use the word 'marketing' in obnoxious ways all over your site. 'Cause otherwise, how would the people know... I guess. Apparently to 'prove' that our logo is associated with our name we have to begin sentences with it. 'Cause that's normal. I mean, how will the people know that that's our logo otherwise?

I didn't believe the lawyer at first. Then he sent me some approved trademark case studies.

Welcome to Kafka's Castle.

So, if you're applying for a trademark - which is not advised or necessary unless you're selling your business or have a risk of getting your brand ripped off (#getrektchina) - get crass with your brand.

Slap your logo on everything. But most especially next to pricing. Because apparently that pricing is not to be believed unless there's a logo next to it.

As soon as we are approved, or disapproved, I am going to re-design the website.

I should ask for a return on our fees for the loss of web design work based on the requested changes. Oh wait, I can't do that because the trademark examiner doesn't exactly tell you what to do, they leave it up to you to figure out. And what they want defies logic, which is why so many applications are rejected.

Get a lawyer for this process.