You Would Have Had a Better Shot With "Crap Computing™"

Cloud computing providers need not worry about finding an alternative buzzword to describe their services. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has refused Dell (DELL) a trademark on the phrase “cloud computing.” Though Dell had been given preliminary notice in July that it could have the trademark, the USPTO seems to have thought better of that decision. “… The applied-for mark merely describes a feature and characteristic of applicant’s services,” the Office explained in its “non-final” refusal of Dell’s application. “In addition to being merely descriptive, the applied-for mark appears to be generic in connection with the identified services and, therefore, incapable of functioning as a source-identifier for applicant’s services.”

And that’s a conclusion that makes perfect sense, as cloud computing consultant Sam Johnston notes. Said Johnston, “… Few of us think ‘Dell’ when we think of ‘cloud computing’, even in this context.”