What's even worse is one of the original posters on that thread ('sAyer' - a self-proclaimed paralegal) > From a legal standpoint (ISRG) should have trademarke

What's even worse is one of the original posters on that thread ('sAyer' - a self-proclaimed paralegal) > From a legal standpoint (ISRG) should have trademarked this when they started using it publicly in November of 2014. There negligence to have done so is why this debate is happening. Then they want to cry foul because of their failure to follow the simplest of product protections. Registering your trademarks. The one who is in possession of the registered trademark is the owner, and that is the law. That is just deeply, totally, entirely wrong as far as the USA goes. I'm going to give this person the benefit of the doubt and just assume there's some i18n misunderstanding going on here, but in the USA, registration is a formality that's simply not required to afford trademark protection.