Trademark Law Writing Assignments – Fall 2025

• Syllabus and readings (home page)
• Important course information: materials, mechanics, policies, and grading
• Writing assignments and related instructions
• Open Educational Resources (OER) copyright and permissions information

WRITING ASSIGNMENTS: BASIC REQUIREMENTS AND MECHANICS

The graded work for this course consists of three short (3-4 pp.) writing assignments. These may consist of legal memoranda (to colleagues, clients, or others); explanatory email messages (again, to one or more audiences); or PowerPoint [or equivalent] slide decks (in which the lawyer communicates by the content of the slide deck, not by delivering a presentation orally). Each assignment will be posted here approximately two weeks before the assignment is due. Also before the assignment is due, time in class will be set aside to discuss questions relating to each assignment.

FORMAT EXPECTATIONS

Prior versions of this course have required that writing assignments be produced in solely in the format of traditional legal memos. That expectation has changed, because lawyers today increasingly communicate in other formats and other media. This course may require different formats.

HOW TO SUCCEED

Although the formats may change, professional expectations regarding effective communication have not changed. Legal writing in every setting should be clear, consistent, polished, expert, ethical, responsive, and trustworthy. Those expectations apply to this course. For guidance regarding those expectations and how they apply to the graded work for this course, students are strongly encouraged to read and re-read this “Modern Legal Writing” document, which summarizes advice for producing a great work product in Professor Madison’s courses.

For help with basic writing questions (grammar, syntax, word choice, active vs. passive voice, and so on), consider trying editing / writing correction / grammar checking software. A good choice – with a free option – is Grammarly. An alternative choice that may be better suited to professional writing but one that costs real money, is WordRake. WordRake may be a useful investment now that pays off over a full professional career. The founder and creator of WordRake, Gary Kinder, is a tremendous, experienced writer in his own right. Professor Madison says: “I took a writing seminar from him when I was a junior lawyer, and I still remember and use his lessons even today.”

LEARNING AI

This page contains the full course policy on AI use in connection with these assignments. If you want to learn more about AI and its capabilities, and how it can help you become a better lawyer (also, how you can start to meet expectations of your internship employers and employers after law school), here is an excellent FREE tutorial, produced by Professor Dan Linna at Northwestern University.

RUBRIC

The rubric used to mark the assignments is available here.

Writing assignment due dates

• Assignment 1:  Friday, October 3, 2025, at 3 pm.
• Assignment 2:  Friday, November 7, 2025, at 3 pm.
• Assignment 3:  Last day of exams (Wednesday, December 10, 2025), at 12 noon.

SAMPLE QUESTIONS

For students who want to know more about the assignments for this course, here is a page containing the text of some prior assignments.

ASSIGNMENTS

Assignment Three

To:        Junior Lawyer, Dewey, Cheatem & Howe
From:   Senior Lawyer, Dewey, Cheatem & Howe
Re:       Pizza matter
Date: November 12, 2025

We represent a local restaurant named “Briks Pizza.”  It operates a location in Mahomet, Illinois, not too far from our firm’s office in Champaign. The restaurant is well-liked and is profitable, and the owners are interested in opening a second restaurant, under the same name, here in Champaign.  They’ve come to us for advice as to whether they should.

Here is the issue.  I’d like your thoughts as to what to ask them, and as to how to counsel them.

Briks opened in Mahomet in early 2024, serving brick oven pizza. As you know, Mahomet is roughly 10 miles outside of Champaign.  Briks is a local business and not part of a larger enterprise or chain.  On their own, the owners registered “Briks Pizza” as a business name until Illinois law but did not register a mark with the USPTO.

The Mahomet restaurant is doing so well that the owners are contemplating opening another “Briks” in Champaign. As you know, the town is home to the University of Illinois, and college students are a perfect pizza audience.  The Mahomet location is sufficiently far away from campus that students, as a rule, do not eat there.

According to our client, one additional motivation for the expansion is the fact that Brixx Pizza, a company that owns restaurants under that name serving brick oven pizza, closed its restaurant in Champaign in early 2025. Brixx opened the Champaign restaurant in 2018.  (I wasn’t aware of Brixx until the client explained this part of the story.) Brixx previously operated locations in North Carolina and South Carolina. I did some quick checking; the company registered the mark “Brixx Pizza” with the USPTO in 2015.

The client is concerned, of course, that if Briks opens in Champaign, then Brixx will sue on trademark grounds, or at least threaten to do so. The client is insistent that Brixx has no grounds for a lawsuit, because Brixx has left town.

I’ve already informed the client that in practical terms, business conflicts, including potential business conflicts, tend to end in settlement rather than victory in court.  They’re not happy about that possible outcome, but they are (reluctantly) open to the possibility and, in addition to talking through our investigation and analysis of the matter, will hear us out as to the virtues and drawbacks of a negotiated solution.  As part of your analysis and ideas for investigating the matter and counseling the client, I need to know your ideas as to the content of a possible deal, in case that turns out to be where we are headed.

I need your work no later than Wednesday, December 10, 2025 at 12 noon.

Rules and Guidelines for Assignment Three

To the extent that these rules may appear to conflict with general advice regarding work product that appears in course-related webpages, these rules take precedence.

This is an “open” problem, meaning that there are no limits on the resources that you may bring to bear on your work. Among other things, you may consult with your classmates and other human beings. If you discuss the merits of the assignment with anyone, however, you must disclose that person’s identity on or in your work product. Write the names of any of these “consultants” at the top of the first page of the document.

Use your own name in the “From” field. Your work product is not anonymous.

Format

Your work product in response to this assignment should be formatted in one of two ways: (i) as an email rather than as a default or standard “legal research memo.” Your email should consist of not more than 1,200 words, excluding the header (To, From, Subject line, Date). In printed form, it should have 1″ minimum margins on all sides. OR (ii) as a set of PowerPoint slides, prepared for delivery as a printed work product, rather than as a guide or accompaniment to an oral presentation. Including a title slide, the total PowerPoint “slide deck” should consist of no more than 25 slides. [The “25 slide” rule conflicts with the “12 slide” rule listed on the Important Course Information page. The discrepancy is an error on my part. Follow the “25 slide” rule. For guidance and suggestions regarding how to prepare professional PowerPoint slides, review these examples.]

You do not need to include a comprehensive statement of the facts; instead, you may refer to the factual background in my memo to you. A factual summary may be helpful, however, in framing and presenting your analysis. No footnotes are permitted.

You may use any font that you wish, but of course take care that all aspects of your work product should look, as well as be, professional.

So that your work product can be graded electronically, you must use Microsoft WORD (in the case of option (i)) or Microsoft PowerPoint (in the case of option (ii)).

Grading

Work product will be graded based on form, format, and writing quality as well as on content. The assignments are designed so as not to have any single correct or even best solution. Each problem may present a range of issues that your work should identify, analyze, and solve in a creative way.

Due date

One copy of the work product prepared for this assignment must be turned in not later than Wednesday, December 10, 2025 at 12 noon.

Your work product must be turned in as an attachment, in MS Word or MS PowerPoint format, to an email to Professor Madison.

There were be no extensions or exceptions to the deadline. Work product that does not conform to the format instructions above, or that is turned in late, will be accepted but is subject to grade reduction.

Assignment Two

To:        Junior Lawyer, Dewey, Cheatem & Howe
From:   Senior Lawyer, Dewey, Cheatem & Howe
Re:       Apples to apples trademark matter
Date: October 23, 2025

We’ve been approached to handle the plaintiff’s side of a new trademark case.  Apparently the Complaint and Answer are already on file.  The initial plaintiff’s law firm has had to withdraw from the matter because a conflict of interest arose.

Here is a summary of the facts, as I understand them and as they are pleaded in the Complaint:

The plaintiff, our prospective client, is a commercial apple grower named Grand Trees.  It owns an incontestable trademark registration for the word mark “Lady in Pink” for a pink-hued variety of apples – a version of an apple cultivar called “Blood Pink.”  (A cultivar is a type of cultivated plant.)  Grand Trees licensed the mark to the defendant, another commercial apple grower, in connection with growing and selling apples from trees from the Blood Pink cultivar.  The defendant is named Specialty Apples.  Grand Trees alleges that Specialty Apples has been growing and selling apples using the “Lady in Pink” mark and that Specialty Apples has used the mark in connection with apples from a different cultivar – the “Cherry Blossom” cultivar.  To Grand Trees, these are unlicensed trees and therefore unlicensed apples.

Specialty Apples filed an Answer that includes two affirmative defenses.  This is where I need your help.  One, Specialty Apples alleges that the license consists of a “naked license,” invalidating the mark.  Two, Specialty Apples alleges that if the mark is valid, then its use of the “Lady in Pink” mark is fair under the doctrine of descriptive fair use.

We do not yet have facts in hand sufficient to figure out whether either defense will hold water.  We need a plan, first for interviewing the client to gather facts that the client may have, and second for additional research so that we can build our strongest case (and know its weaknesses) on both points. With a clearer sense of the simplicity or complexity of the matter, then we will be able to determine whether to accept the representation and move ahead with the litigation.

Can you please outline that plan for me? I need your work product not later than 3 pm on Friday, November 7.

Rules and Guidelines for Assignment Two

To the extent that these rules may appear to conflict with general advice regarding work product that appears in course-related webpages, these rules take precedence.

This is an “open” problem, meaning that there are no limits on the resources that you may bring to bear on your work. Among other things, you may consult with your classmates and other human beings. If you discuss the merits of the assignment with anyone, however, you must disclose that person’s identity on or in your work product. Write the names of any of these “consultants” at the top of the first page of the document.

Use your own name in the “From” field. Your work product is not anonymous.

Format

Your work product in response to this assignment should be formatted as an email rather than as a default or standard “legal research memo.” It must be typed or printed using a computer. Your email should consist of not more than 1,200 words, excluding the header (To, From, Subject line, Date) and information about humans and any computer services that you consulted. In printed form, it should have 1″ minimum margins on all sides. For the content, be guided by the advice in the “Modern Legal Writing” document cited above.

You do not need to include a comprehensive statement of the facts; instead, you may refer to the factual background in my memo to you. Omitting a factual summary may be unwise nevertheless. A factual summary may be helpful in framing and presenting the analysis of the memo.

No footnotes are permitted.

The following font must be used: Twelve [12] point Times New Roman.

So that the memos can be graded electronically, you must use Microsoft WORD for the final, submitted version of the memo.

Grading

Work product will be graded based on form, format, and writing quality as well as on content. The assignments are designed so as not to have any single correct or even best solution. Each problem may present a range of issues that your work should identify, analyze, and solve in a creative way.

Due date

One copy of the work product prepared for this assignment must be turned in not later than Friday, November 7, 2025, at 3 pm.

Your work product must be turned in as an attachment, in MS Word format, to an email to Professor Madison.

There were be no extensions or exceptions to the deadline. Work product that does not conform to the format instructions above, or that is turned in late, will be accepted but is subject to grade reduction.

Assignment One

To:        Junior Lawyer, Dewey, Cheatem & Howe
From:   Senior Lawyer, Dewey, Cheatem & Howe
Re:       BrightCo trademark matter
Date: September 17, 2025

I need some help thinking through and organizing a plan for our client BrightCo.  Here is what I know so far:

BrightCo makes and sells equipment for recreational runners and walkers.  The line of products includes reflective vests, belts, sashes, hats, and clip-on lights; all of them have a fluorescent lime green color pattern, although in some cases there is reflective silver and/or red tape used as striping or edging.  Internally, BrightCo refers to these as the “LimeLite” products.  The LimeLite name does not appear on tags or labels on all of its merchandise, so far as I know right now, but the client tells me the packaging for LimeLight products now includes a cardboard cover that includes the phrase LimeLite^TM. I have yet to see any of the products or packaging myself, and the client did not say when LimeLite^TM was added to the packaging.  The company has been in business since 2010, selling the same or closely related versions of the products that it sells today, and it conducts all of its sales, and does all of its advertising, online, via the website at bright.xyz.  BrightCo does not own any federal trademark registrations.

Six months ago, and shortly after BrightCo retained this firm, we filed an application to register LimeLite as a trademark. At that point, things got complicated. The Trademark Examiner found, in the USPTO database, an application to register a similar mark: “Lime-Light,” for running clothes that are based on reflective green materials (socks, shorts, pants, and jackets).  The “Lime-Light” line of products is produced by a small company in Boston (also called “Lime-Light”) that has sold its products solely out of a single retail storefront in a Boston suburb, and that conducts (so far as we can tell, based on initial research by my paralegal) no advertising whatsoever.

Nevertheless, the “Lime-Light” application was filed before the “LimeLite” application.  The USPTO had published the “Lime-Light” application (and it declined to publish the “LimeLite” application), and the “Lime-Light” mark was registered in August of this year.  The “Lime-Light” registration includes a first use date of January 30, 2015.  Apparently our client did not notice the publication of the application; the publication took place before our firm was retained.  Also, and in its review of existing marks, the USPTO only consulted its own database of registered marks.

Now, “Lime-Light” has sent BrightCo a cease-and-desist letter, alleging infringement of the Lime-Light mark under both Section 32 and Section 43 of the Lanham Act.

We need a game plan right away. Can you assemble a four-page (max) document that outlines our client’s most promising lines of argument (law and fact) and sketches out the factual material that we need to collect both to make our case in defense and, if appropriate, to pursue remedies against Lime-Light? 

Note a couple of things as an initial matter:

One, my summary above is based on a preliminary conversation with the client’s president, so I may have missed key information.  As part of your review, explain what else we might need and want to know, and why.

Two, tactically I know that it is usually unwise to lead off a trademark argument with a debate about likelihood of confusion.  That’s a multi-factor morass that sucks up time and grinds down clients and their ability to pay our fees.  If we can manage to, I’d like to emphasize a strategy that focuses on other aspects of trademark law.

Please have your work product to me no later than Friday, October 3, 2025, at 3 pm.

.Rules and Guidelines for Assignment One

To the extent that these rules may appear to conflict with general advice regarding work product that appears in course-related webpages, these rules take precedence.

This is an “open” problem, meaning that there are no limits on the resources that you may bring to bear on your work. Among other things, you may consult with your classmates and other human beings. If you discuss the merits of the assignment with anyone, however, you must disclose that person’s identity on or in your work product. Write the names of any of these “consultants” at the top of the first page of the document.

Use your own name in the “From” field. Your work product is not anonymous.

Format

You should use the default or standard “legal research memo” form and format for this assignment. For the content, be guided by the advice in the “Modern Legal Writing” document cited above.

Memos must be typed or printed using a computer. Each memo, including any attachments, must be not longer than four [4] typewritten or printed pages, double-spaced, with 1″ minimum margins on all sides. “To,” “From,” “Re,” and “Date” headings may be single spaced, and the “consultants” list and description of any AI consultation may appear inside the 1″ margin at the top of the first page.

You do not need to include a comprehensive statement of the facts; instead, you may refer to the factual background in my memo to you. Omitting a factual summary may be unwise nevertheless. A factual summary may be helpful in framing and presenting the analysis of the memo.

No footnotes are permitted.

The following font must be used: Twelve [12] point Times New Roman.

So that the memos can be graded electronically, you must use Microsoft WORD for the final, submitted version of the memo.

Grading

Work product will be graded based on form, format, and writing quality as well as on content. The assignments are designed so as not to have any single correct or even best solution. Each problem may present a range of issues that your work should identify, analyze, and solve in a creative way.

Due date

One copy of the work product prepared for this assignment must be turned in not later than Friday, October 3, 2025, at 3 pm.

Your work product must be turned in to me (Professor Madison) as an attachment to an email message.

There were be no extensions or exceptions to the deadline. Work product that does not conform to the format instructions above, or that is turned in late, will be accepted but is subject to grade reduction.