To help evaluate your overall awareness of intellectual property knowledge and to provide access to additional educational materials based on the assessment results, please use the Intellectual Property Awareness Assessment tool, available at http://www.uspto.gov/inventors/assessment.
Also owning a federal trademark registration on the Principal Register provides a number of significant advantages over common law rights alone, including: • A legal presumption of your ownership of the mark and your exclusive right to use the mark nationwide on or in connection with the goods/services listed in the registration (whereas a state registration only provides rights within the borders of that one state, and common law rights exist only for the specific area where the mark is used);
• Public notice of your claim of ownership of the mark;
• Listing in the USPTO’s online databases;
• The ability to record the U.S. registration with the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Service to prevent importation of infringing foreign goods;
• The right to use the federal registration symbol “® ”; • The ability to bring an action concerning the mark in federal court; and • The use of the U.S. registration as a basis to obtain registration in foreign countries.