Rubik’s Cube trademark outlives craze as U.S. seeks 1980s relief

WASHINGTON – Three decades after the height of their popularity, U.S. customs officials are still supposed to be on the lookout for knockoff Rubik’s Cube and Pac-Man games.

With more pressing demands of the modern era, Customs and Border Protection is now asking a trade panel to relieve the agency from having to keep tabs on faded fads from as far back as 1979. It said trademarks covered by six import bans are either not in use or the owner stopped making required filings, according to a notice yesterday from the U.S. International Trade Commission.

“It was awesome that customs said ‘We’re tired of dealing with strip lights and Pac-Man machines since the 1970s and can we please stop?’” said Paul Brinkman, a patent lawyer with Quinn Emanuel in Washington who specializes in cases at the trade panel. “Customs is tired of having to enforce this.”

While patents have limited lifespans, trademarks last as long as they are in use, with the oldest being for Samson Rope, which depicts Samson slaying a lion, issued in 1884. In the case of some products that fall out of popularity, the original owners who obtained the orders also disappear.

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Ideal Toy Co., which got the ITC in 1982 to order Customs to block any copycat versions of its Rubik’s Cube, went through a series of owners and Hasbro Inc. now makes the puzzle. Midway Manufacturing Co. was the original owner of the Pac-Man coin- operated arcade games, and its Galaxian game is protected under a separate import ban on knockoffs also under review. The company changed names and eventually filed for bankruptcy in 2009, selling some assets.

Tupperware enforcers

“I wouldn’t be surprised if some companies come forward and said, we didn’t even know,” said Lyle Vander Schaaf, a lawyer at Brinks Gilson & Lione in Washington, who argues ITC cases.

The other items Customs asked the ITC to take off its watch list include flexible strip lights, cardboard kaleidoscopes and plastic tumblers that had games inside them. The ITC in its notice yesterday said it’s asking for public input on whether the import-ban orders should be rescinded.

It would be easy for any of the current owners of the trademarks to make sure the orders remain in effect, Brinkman said.

“All you need it do is say, yeah, we still care and we still have the trademark,” he said. “They’ll file a compliance report and Customs will have to enforce it more closely because Hasbro will be down at the loading dock.”

Not every 1980s-era import ban is up for review. There are still orders in effect for cast iron stoves, cloisonne jewelry and Tupperware Brands Corp.’s signature storage containers.

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