The question before the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York was whether Yves Saint Laurent (YSL) could continue to use red soles on shoes because the hopeless USPTO in 2008 had granted Christian Louboutin a trademark for women’s high fashion designer footwear with lacquered red soles.

Louboutin now claims that YSL is using a confusingly similar red shade on their shoe soles. Arina Shulga at the LexisNexis Communities Copyright & Trademark Law Community has the story at How Strong is Your Trademark? – The Red Shoe Sole Design Saga.

Looked at humorously, shoe fashion designers can count themselves lucky that the USPTO has not had a chance to issue trademarks on all the basic colors, which would thereby effectively block any new fashion designers at all from entering the market because all the colors would then have been taken.

And let us hope that this color trademarking does not extend broadly to other industries, which could make new enterprises impossible because of a dearth of available hues.

LOL (laughing out loud).