German dildo peddlar has balls

Trademark law becomes pruriently interesting.

It’s been a while since an excuse for some schoolboy tittering graced the ‘Monster’s electronic interface.

A German sex toy manufacturer has appealed a decision by the EU’s trademark office to refuse a ‘3D trademark’ for the shape of one of its devices.

The ‘YOOO’ model is described as a ‘new, stylish, futuristic lay-on vibrator’ made up of ‘3 little balls’, and all for the perhaps predictable price of 69 euros.

But the innovative shape has fallen foul of an application by the Fun Factory brand to get an EU trademark.

And the EU’s intellectual property officials at the Alicante-based agency clearly did their research.

Refusing the request to trademark the shape of the YOOO toy, the EU trademark office said “there is an array of shapes of corresponding products from competitors which, while often rod-shaped, were also sometimes characterised by spherical or other rounded shapes.”

The function, they said, dictated the form, which meant it couldn’t get a trademark.

Fun Factory has taken the case to the EU courts.

Presumably the judges there will have as much fun researching this case as they did a couple of years ago, when a Belgian sex shop tried to get tax breaks given to cinemas because of the movie-viewing booths at the back.

BM