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OpenAI has applied for “GPT” trademark with USPTO
- Aperocky 4y agoOpenAI is anything but open, with the same logic nvidia should try to apply for "GPU" trademark.
- GloriousKoji 4y agonVidia already went further than a GPU trademark and tried to claim the "gaming" label as a geforce only thing.
- Aperocky 4y agoAt least it's not named "OpenVidia"
- gabereiser 4y agoWould ya’ll stop giving them ideas?! You know their lawyers read HN!!
- RC_ITR 4y agoSony invented the term GPU. The G stood for geometry then, but “graphics” is just a backsolve. NVDA is might have a claim on “graphics processing unit” but that’s a way less valuable mark than “GPU” https://www.computer.org/publications/tech-news/chasing-pixels/is-it-time-to-rename-the-gpu/ https://www.computer.org/publications/tech-news/chasing-pixe...
- paxys 4y agoDon't give them ideas
- davidkuennen 4y agoThey make their AI accessible to anyone. Sounds pretty open to me. Maybe not for developers, since they associate „open“ with open source, but surely for everyone else.
- Y_Y 4y agoIsn't that the same as any other company offering services for money? The fact that they give freebies doesn't make them "open". It would be far too vague, nevermind that "open" already has a specific well-established meaning in the context.
- turingfeel 4y agoDo you consider Apple an "open" company because they allow you to purchase an iPhone from them rather than keeping it for themselves?
- sebzim4500 4y agoNo, but if their competitors didn't let you buy a phone then I might.
- isaacremuant 4y agoThen any software with a free tier is open. Because ChatGPT can't even be used worldwide. Defining it as such, makes it meaningless. Open, in software, means much greater access.
- sokoloff 4y agoMost executives and schoolchildren didn’t know what the hell they were a year ago. Now my middle schoolers are playing with them. That’s greater access by any reasonable measure.
- rurp 4y agoYou could have said the same thing about Netflix a decade ago, but naming themselves OpenStreaming would have been just as ridiculous. Having a popular product has nothing to do with being an open company.
- drexlspivey 4y agoAny company that sells a product is open then
- hnfong 4y ago"Linux" is trademarked - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_Mark_Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_Mark_Institute OpenAI is anything but open, but IMHO trademarking their product names is one of their more reasonable actions.
- Aperocky 4y agoTrademark ChatGPT, or even GPT-4, but no GPT. It's like trademarking "Operating System", completely ridiculous.
- matemp 3y agohttps://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=763049f7-7ef8-4a68-bdb1-2e4fa194b7ad https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=763049f7-7ef8...
- amrrs 4y agoFor those unaware - GPT stands for Generative pre-trained transformers (GPT). It's a type of a deep neural network architecture that builds on top of Transformers which was released by Google researchers. I'm wondering what would happen if someone copyrights "Transformers" now :-/
- LeoPanthera 4y agoHasbro might have something to say about that.
- neilv 4y agoEmergent behavior is more than meets the eye.
- PeterisP 4y agoNot really, trademarks are industry-specific, and having a registered trademark in another industry where there is no reasonable confusion is not an obstacle. For example, "Oracle" is a valid registered trademark for cigars and for archery bow sights and for many, many other things, despite also being a trademark for one of the most litigious firms in the software industry.
- galleywest200 4y agoAre they industry specific? Monster Energy has a history of suing for trademark infringement over the word "Monster" in video game titles. Companies have caved to their requests. Unsure if that was due to validity or lack of willing to pay legal fees. https://news.yahoo.com/monster-energy-tried-pok-mon-224500250.html https://news.yahoo.com/monster-energy-tried-pok-mon-22450025...
- kube-system 4y agoYes, they are definitely industry specific. Which is why both Best Buy and your grocery store can sell Apples. Monster has been involved in esports previously. https://www.monsterenergy.com/gaming https://www.monsterenergy.com/gaming
- anigbrowl 4y agoThis seems overly broad, like trying to trademark the phrase 'vacuum cleaner'.
- qbrass 4y agoTurns out 'vacuum Cleaner' isn't overly broad enough. https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4805:295y42.2.11 https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4805:29...
- SketchySeaBeast 4y agoOr even if it isn't, it'll become a generic trademark like Aspirin.
- skunkworker 4y agoThe session link expired.
- amrrs 4y agoGo to https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/ https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/ and Click New Search and Search for GPT Or check this link https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=97733259&caseType=SERIAL_NO&searchType=statusSearch https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=97733259&caseType=SERIAL_... Not sure how long this will be valid.
- zerocrates 4y agoI don't think you can really ever hotlink into TESS. A better link that (I think) will actually work would be: http://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=97733259&caseType=SERIAL_NO&searchType=statusSearch http://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=97733259&caseType=SERIAL_N...
- gkoberger 4y agoThey also just released "guidelines" for how to refer to building on their platform: https://openai.com/brand https://openai.com/brand
- NameError 4y agoI'm curious about this, in the plugins section: Do: BarkBytes plugin for ChatGPT BarkBytes ChatGPT plugin Don’t: BarkBytes plugin for OpenAI BarkBytes plugin compatible with ChatGPT BarkBytes plugin works with ChatGPT BarkBytes plugin integrated with ChatGPT A plugin is basically just an API that the provider allows ChatGPT to access, and a specification of that API. There's no reason you couldn't allow other non-OpenAI models to use your plugin too. Is OpenAI saying plugin providers -must- refer to their plugin as ChatGPT-exclusive, even if it's not?
- preommr 4y agoYea that's weird. I can underestand rules to avoid things like "OpenAI Barkbytes Plugin", but Barkbytes plugin compatible inegrated with ChatGPT seems fine.
- hombre_fatal 4y agoThey're talking about "BarkBytes plugin" (for ChatGPT), not "BarkBytes" the service nor BarkBytes plugins for any other service. When you have a "plugin", you've developed software that plugs into something. They're telling you how they'd like to be referred to when you build a plugin for ChatGPT. They don't care how you phrase "BarkBytes Safari plugin", "BarkBytes plugin for Garmin", or whatever.
- ronsor 4y ago> BarkBytes plugin compatible with ChatGPT > BarkBytes plugin works with ChatGPT > BarkBytes plugin integrated with ChatGPT Aren't these three just literal statements of fact, in the same way one might say "XYZ app works with iOS"?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- JohnFen 4y agoOf course they did. They have a strong desire to milk this thing for every dime they possibly can.
- detrites 4y agoNope'n'AI strikes again.
- amrrs 4y agoSorry that links seems to have expired, please check this - https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=97733259&caseType=SERIAL_NO&searchType=statusSearch https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=97733259&caseType=SERIAL_... I'm not sure how to share with persistent session
- amelius 4y agoDoes this mean that you can't write a scientific paper and refer to GPT without using the ™ symbol on it?
- function_seven 4y agoNo. You can use trademarked terms all you want in all sorts of writings. What you can't do is trade using that name. Merely discussing a trademarked product is always allowed. And the ™ symbol is for unregistered trademarks, whereas ® is used for registered marks. In either case, these symbols are used by the company that owns or claims the marks, or by affiliates who agree to mark them as such when licensing the marks. I am not even remotely a lawyer so this is all just, like, what I think I know.
- PeterisP 4y agoNominative reference to OpenAI's GPT would not be restricted, however, if you'd want to assert that the thing you made in your experiment is GPT or GPT-like, that might be iffy.
- shon 4y agoA filing date of 12/27/23 makes me think they’re either a little surprised at the popularity or not super-strong at biz-ops.
- pianoben 4y agoOr they're zealous dogfooders, and had ChatGPT™ fill out the application itself :)
- seydor 4y agothat was a long time ago, no? They have also applied for GPT-3, GPT-4, but not GPT-5 I don't see the point though, it's not like some amazing name
- PeterisP 4y agoThey applied for GPT-3 back at december 2020; however, the trademark application for "GPT" (without the numbers) is a relatively new one, from december 2022.
- yakkityyak 4y agoWill always be GUID Partition Table to me.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- mikeryan 4y agoI'm actually interested to see if this is accepted. Common words are fine for Trademarks but in this case "GPT" could be considered a "generic" form however in a very niche field. My understanding is that "Apple" as the trademark for a computer company is fine. "Apple" for a brand of apple juice would not be.
- ronsor 4y agoI hope it's not, since I already bought MyGPT.ai
- nullc 4y agoIt may be wise to file an opposition unless you're looking forward to losing your domain without compensation.
- ronsor 4y agoI need to figure out how to do that.
- kirubakaran 4y agoI couldn't resist asking ChatGPT to help with this: --- Filing a trademark opposition is a legal process that allows an individual or entity to challenge the registration of a trademark that they believe may infringe on their own rights or cause confusion in the marketplace. The process may vary slightly depending on the jurisdiction, but here are the general steps you can follow: 1. Monitor trademark publications: Keep an eye on trademark registers, such as the Official Gazette in the United States, to identify trademarks that you believe may infringe on your rights. 2. Understand the grounds for opposition: Ensure you have valid grounds for opposing the registration, such as the likelihood of confusion, similarity with an earlier mark, bad faith filing, or a lack of distinctiveness. 3. Check the deadline for opposition: Be aware of the deadline for filing an opposition, which typically starts from the date the mark is published. Deadlines may vary by jurisdiction, so ensure you are aware of the specific deadline in your country. 4. Gather supporting evidence: Collect any evidence that supports your opposition, including documents that demonstrate your use of the mark, evidence of confusion in the marketplace, or any other relevant materials. 5. Prepare and file the Notice of Opposition: Draft a formal Notice of Opposition that outlines the grounds for your opposition and includes all supporting evidence. This document must be filed with the appropriate trademark office or tribunal, such as the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) in the United States. 6. Serve the notice on the applicant: In some jurisdictions, you may be required to serve a copy of the Notice of Opposition on the applicant or their legal representative. 7. Participate in the opposition proceedings: After filing your opposition, you may need to participate in various stages of the proceedings, including discovery, pretrial disclosures, and trial. This may involve submitting additional evidence, deposing witnesses, or attending hearings. 8. Await the decision: The trademark office or tribunal will issue a decision based on the evidence and arguments presented by both parties. If the opposition is successful, the opposed trademark application may be refused or subject to certain conditions. If unsuccessful, the opposed mark will proceed to registration. It's important to note that trademark opposition can be a complex and time-consuming process. It's often advisable to consult with an experienced trademark attorney to ensure that your opposition is filed correctly and to increase your chances of success.
- sva_ 4y agoIt's all for the democratization of AI, folks.
- moffkalast 4y ago[flagged]
- notahacker 4y agoThey'll never be able to "ensure artificial general intelligence that benefits the whole of humanity" without the ability to force GPT-J to change its name...
- icyfox 4y agoThey're going to have to clear a pretty big hurdle in establishing a trademark once it's been out in commerce for so long. But let's assume that they do. I actually think this will prove to be a good move for the ML ecosystem over the long term. There are so many products branding themselves as "[Vertical]GPT" that many non-technical users are under the illusion that the solution is endorsed by the same people that make ChatGPT. People in the tech circle knows that OpenAI isn't pushing out "DogBarkGPT" but with the shared suffix that's not immediately obvious. Their suggested "powered by GPT" is a much more honest phrasing. While being too aggressive about brand guidelines and usage patterns can unintentionally harm innovation and competitors, I don't think encouraging others to stay away from capturing the phrase credibility is a bad idea.
- reaperman 4y agoMaybe using a term of art for a brand name was a terrible idea to begin with. "Bard" makes sense. "GPT" is a bad name.
- PeterisP 4y agoI get a feeling that this wasn't planned, that this "just happened" after the release of ChatGPT and by that time it was obvious that "GPT" was the brand people were talking about and you can't simply turn the tide. The trademark application was from december 2022, after the release of chatGPT. If they wanted to use GPT as a brand name, they'd have filed the trademark before that, perhaps back in 2020 when the GPT-3 trademark application was submitted without trying to also trademark "GPT" as such.
- jacquesm 4y ago> I get a feeling that this wasn't planned, that this "just happened" after the release of ChatGPT and by that time it was obvious that "GPT" was the brand people were talking about and you can't simply turn the tide. That's their problem though. Trying to trademark a well known term of art that you didn't even come up with is a very bad trick.
- pluc 4y agoMust be one of them open trademarks
- CyberRabbi 4y agoCan I still use their trademark if I train my AI algorithm on it first then use it to generate the trademark?
- doodlesdev 4y agohttps://archive.is/3CXdx https://archive.is/3CXdx https://web.archive.org/web/20230424200928/https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4802:jtelqq.2.16 https://web.archive.org/web/20230424200928/https://tmsearch....
- Workaccount2 4y agoOpenAI would be better off moving away from using "GPT" in their product names rather than trying to take the name back. While I am sure their core reasoning is confusion (it seems every AI product now, whether on the API or using another model throws "GPT" in the name), and I think they could make a good case, the phrase is to general and too widespread now. Come up with something else, do a name change, trademark, and move on.
- swyx 4y agonope, GPT is in the public consciousness now, and no matter how awkward, that is a precious enough market position to have that it is not worth changing imo
- TillE 4y agoYeah, ChatGPT is basically the Xerox of LLM products at this point. Its name recognition is huge.
- whimsicalism 4y agoYeah, although there are actually other good copiers.
- jacquesm 4y agoThen they will have to live with sharing the term with others.
- jameslevy 4y agoHopefully they will publicly commit to only using this trademark defensively if granted. In other words, to give OpenAI the benefit of the doubt here, they may just want to prevent someone else from trademarking "GPT" and taking legal action against them.
- dude3 4y agoI am hopeful they rename the company as well and remove "Open". It seems all they are doing is setting up a walled garden.
- slazien 4y agoOpenAI didn't provide the right type of evidence, so the trademark request got dismissed: https://tsdr.uspto.gov/documentviewer?caseId=sn97733259&docId=PTD20230418160641#docIndex=0&page=1 https://tsdr.uspto.gov/documentviewer?caseId=sn97733259&docI... (probably until they try again). Apparently, they... didn't even pay the petition fee
- wskish 4y agoIt was the "petition to make special" (something like a request to speed up the process) that was dismissed, not the trademark application. https://tsdr.uspto.gov/documentviewer?caseId=sn97733259&docId=RMS20230316151604#docIndex=1&page=1 https://tsdr.uspto.gov/documentviewer?caseId=sn97733259&docI...
- slazien 4y agoAh, good catch!
- spullara 4y agoI registered gpt.vc over 2 years ago. They are late to the party.
- AbuAssar 4y agoit is their mistake that they didn't choose a good name for ChatGPT or for gpt3 or 4 thay already have dalle and codex they should have given the chatbot a more patentable name
- discordianfish 4y agoCall it playing devil's advocate here but given all the scam around "SomethingGPT" I find it reasonable to assume they try to trademark it mainly to prevent this.
- oldstrangers 4y agoI imagine it's because they want to get https://chatgpt.com/ https://chatgpt.com/ without paying whatever huge sum is probably being asked for.
- verdverm 4y agoWonder what will happen at the intersection of things like "nanoGPT" by karpathy Will that project require renaming (among the thousands of others), or will the existence of so many mean that "GPT" is generic at this point? https://huggingface.co/models?sort=downloads&search=gpt https://huggingface.co/models?sort=downloads&search=gpt
- madrox 4y agoOpenAI has stumbled at every step apart from "make something really good that people like." DALL-E access was over-controlled and they lost a lot of mindshare to competitors. In the case of ChatGPT, I doubt they even thought about what they would call this thing before releasing it. Of course it's inevitable they'd try to trademark this now, but it's clear all of this is an afterthought. It really leaves me feeling like OpenAI doesn't know what they're doing outside of making really good AI.
- gkoberger 4y agoThis is... well, this is one take. ChatGPT is the fastest growing app of all time, and almost everyone in the US knows what it is. It's absolutely dominating people's mindshare.
- dougb5 4y agoChatGPT follows the naming convention established by InstructGPT and WebGPT -- it's a model fine-tuned on human preferences for good chat outcomes. The name doesn't roll off the tongue, but then, neither does "Airbnb" and that's a verb now :) By their own admission they were quite surprised ChatGPT caught on as much as it did; I don't think they were expecting it to be a huge consumer product as much as a modest "research preview", hence the researchy name.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- seizethecheese 4y agoTrademarks exist to distinguish the provenance of a good/service. The reality is that “GPT” is 100% associated with OpenAI in the minds of most people at this point. The fact that this specifies an architecture seems incidental as anyone can use this architecture and just market it with a different term. Getting upset by this seems like pearl-clutching.
- jacquesm 4y agoNo it is exactly the kind of landgrab that shouldn't happen. GPT is a universal term and OpenAI didn't even come up with it. By rights it should be either not held by anybody or by the people that initially made it a well known term within the industry. Because it would be absolutely outrageous if OpenAI ended up in a position to use trademark law against the party that came up with a term.
- seizethecheese 4y agoTrademark law is not about these moralistic feelings. It’s about distinguishing commercial parties. If I see “GPT” I expect it’s from OpenAI. Anyone can still use the term just not in offering a commercial product.
- jacquesm 4y agoI see GPT I read 'generative pre-trained transformer' which is a thing that others have built prior to OpenAI.
- seizethecheese 4y agoYou’re in the great minority here. The vast majority of people who see GPT in a commercial product will expect it to be from OpenAI.
- anothernewdude 4y agoNo, that's just their PR. The vast majority of people don't know what OpenAI is, nor care.
- ChatGTP 4y agoThese guys are joking, honestly? No one else can own IP, but they can own the name of something they didn’t invent ?
- wdabney 4y agoEvery time we call something GPT we invariably would reference OpenAI's work. This tells me they don't want us to do that, and would instead like to control what can be called GPT and what cannot. Great, they've showed their intentions and we should respond accordingly. Don't call it GPT, call it parroting (or literally whatever you want). I like this for its connection with the Stochastic Parrots work and because it is already a common usage of the word outside of ML/AI. AutoParrot, BabyParrot, ParrotAPI, etc. We train by first parroting a large natural language corpus and then fine tune the parrot model with RLHF. Companies will do what companies do, but communities work better when they are free (as in thought).
- jll29 4y agoThey may want you to call ¨GPT¨ simply ¨GPT®¨ (registered trademark).
- Uehreka 4y agoI’m seeing a lot of misunderstandings about how trademark works, so just to set the record straight: (As usual, IANAL, and I only know about US trademark law, but many countries have signed IP treaties with the US, so it’s probably at least similar in most places) - Trademark is very different from copyright. Copyright stops you from copying something, trademark only stops you from pretending to be (or be associated with) the person/company the mark represents. - That’s the purpose in the end: Trademark protects consumers from being scammed by imposters. And it’s pretty well-scoped in terms of not doing anything else. - Trademark is much harder for companies to get than copyright, and much easier for them to lose. A company must demonstrate that the average consumer is likely to associate the mark with them and them alone. They must sue anyone who infringes on the mark to demonstrate that they are still protecting it. They can lose protection at any time if the public largely stops associating them with the mark. - Trademarks often apply very narrowly, which is why products in other markets can still be called “GPT” if a consumer wouldn’t likely confuse the two. OpenAI wouldn’t get to “own those three letters”, but they would be the only people allowed to use those three letters in the brand name of an AI model (or however the PTO decides to scope it). - Trademarks by definition MUST be non-functional. A car company can’t trademark the arrangement of gears in their engine, but they CAN trademark the paint color if no one else is using that particular color and consumers associate it with their brand. - A company doesn’t need to “invent” the thing they are named after. Apple didn’t invent apples, Amazon didn’t invent the Amazon. It’s certainly not a great idea to try and get a trademark on a name that was previously used for something else, but if you can demonstrate that consumers now associate the name with your product you may be able to get protection. - And if you can’t demonstrate that consumers generally (it doesn’t have to be all consumers, but it needs to be a lot) associate the name or mark with your product, then you don’t get protection.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- JieJie 4y ago> It’s certainly not a great idea to try and get a trademark on a name that was previously used for something else, but if you can demonstrate that consumers now associate the name with your product you may be able to get protection. See: https://www.cultofmac.com/454244/steve-jobs-naming-macintosh/ https://www.cultofmac.com/454244/steve-jobs-naming-macintosh... > McIntosh eventually granted Apple the rights to use the name “Macintosh” after a cash settlement. The price reportedly fell between $100,000 and “significantly higher.”
- stevespang 4y ago[dead]
- yawnxyz 4y agoWell, there's a bunch of startups with the name "GPT" in them now, and they're probably going to file their trademarks now too... so I can't see USPTO giving OpenAI (which didn't invent the term GPT) any kind of preference?
- chrgy 4y agoHere is the link https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4807:ivx1v5.2.15 https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4807:iv...
- m3kw9 4y agoGoogle has entered the chat
- greenie_beans 4y agothey seriously missed out on an opportunity for a good name.