Azure Not Registered

A little glee out there in the world, as it appears that Microsoft hadn’t gotten ’round to registering “Azure” with the United States Patent and Trademark Office.  “According to searches conducted by Computerworld, Microsoft has not applied for a trademark for either ‘Windows Azure’ or ‘Azure Services Platform’ with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.”  There aren’t any details, though, as to how Computerworld did its search.  If it simply went to TESS and entered “Azure” in the search box, it won’t find registrations that were filed after October 16, 2008.  As the USPTO states on its News page:

Last complete paper filing date: 13 Oct, loaded 21 Oct.

Last complete electronic filing date (TEAS): 16 Oct, loaded 22 Oct.

These dates should be used as guides and do not imply that all Trademark applications carrying these filing dates are available in the system as of the load dates. Updates are scheduled to occur Tuesday through Saturday prior to 5:30 AM.

Now, I’m not going to quibble with the notion that Microsoft probably should have already secured trademark registration for Azure before having it hit the market, but I think it speaks to a larger point here: one should not assume that registration does not exist on a mark simply because it isn’t found in TESS.  There is a lag, of about a week or two.

Microsoft Wants Some of the Cloud

The Wall Street Journal, among other sources, tell me that Microsoft is jumping on the “Cloud” bandwagon, trying mightily to tap into a market that Amazon, Google and others think will lead to BIG! BIG! stuff.

FTA:

Dubbed Azure Services Platform, the new technology is designed to allow large and small corporate customers to dramatically cut their information technology costs by centralizing their IT infrastructure on Microsoft’s “cloud.”

Microsoft is that latest tech giant to join this trend – and attempt to capitalize on it – by building huge data centers that will provide computing services to customers on a pay-as-you-go subscription basis.

I dunno, though.  I’ve talked about Cloud concerns before, especially about data sensitivity, and I can vouch for the fact that drafting briefs and motions is very difficult, formatting-wise, using GoogleApps.  Furthermore, given Microsoft’s massive target on its back, and its notorious security problems, I have a hard time thinking this is ultimately going to be successful for Microsoft.