[00:00:48] Speaker 04:
Okay.

[00:00:49] Speaker 04:
The next argued case is number 17, 1217, and Ray Pro Bono.

[00:00:55] Speaker 04:
Mr. Schachter.

[00:01:00] Speaker 01:
Thank you, Your Honor, and may it please the Court.

[00:01:01] Speaker 01:
My name is Jeremy Schachter.

[00:01:02] Speaker 01:
I'm here on behalf of Pro Bono, LLC.

[00:01:07] Speaker 01:
The mark Pro Bono, spelled P-R-O-B-O-K-N-O-W, is the clear combination of two words, Pro Bono,

[00:01:18] Speaker 01:
and no.

[00:01:21] Speaker 01:
Our client sought to register that mark for its services, which is an online marketplace for providers and consumers of free or affordable legal services.

[00:01:33] Speaker 01:
And the board found it merely descriptive based on evidence of only the word pro bono.

[00:01:40] Speaker 01:
In doing so, that was clear air for two reasons.

[00:01:42] Speaker 01:
First, they didn't have substantial evidence that the combination of pro bono and no

[00:01:47] Speaker 01:
was merely descriptive.

[00:01:49] Speaker 01:
And second, because the combination of pro bono and no is unequivocally suggestive.

[00:01:56] Speaker 01:
First, there's no evidence that the combination of pro bono and no is merely descriptive.

[00:02:02] Speaker 01:
There's no question.

[00:02:03] Speaker 03:
I'm sorry?

[00:02:03] Speaker 03:
Are you suggesting that there might be a dispute over the meaning of the word no or the meaning of the word knowledge?

[00:02:11] Speaker 03:
As I understand it, it was your position all along through the prosecution that

[00:02:16] Speaker 03:
This was some form of a portmanteau or telescoped word of pro bono and knowledge.

[00:02:26] Speaker 03:
And the whole point of this service, this site, is to provide knowledge of pro bono activities.

[00:02:32] Speaker 01:
Well, that's partially correct and partially incorrect.

[00:02:35] Speaker 01:
It is true that our position has always been that the mark is a combination of pro bono and no.

[00:02:42] Speaker 01:
which is a derivative of knowledge.

[00:02:44] Speaker 03:
Okay, and I saw also knowledge.

[00:02:46] Speaker 01:
Sure, sure.

[00:02:47] Speaker 03:
Shortening of knows, the consumer will recognize is a shorthand for knowledge, and they'll see the pro bono, at least when you say it out loud, will recognize it's the ordinary meaning of pro bono.

[00:03:01] Speaker 03:
And so what we're left with is the, I think, the ordinary meaning of know and knowledge and pro bono.

[00:03:09] Speaker 01:
Correct.

[00:03:09] Speaker 03:
And I don't think there was any

[00:03:10] Speaker 03:
dispute over, oh, gosh, we don't know what no means, or we don't know what knowledge means.

[00:03:16] Speaker 01:
Agree.

[00:03:17] Speaker 01:
Agree.

[00:03:17] Speaker 01:
And that's the problem.

[00:03:19] Speaker 01:
Because the only thing that the board relied on was the meaning of the word pro bono.

[00:03:24] Speaker 02:
But wait.

[00:03:24] Speaker 02:
Why is it that descriptive?

[00:03:26] Speaker 02:
I mean, the phrase is knowledge of pro bono services.

[00:03:32] Speaker 01:
Well, that's not what this is.

[00:03:36] Speaker 01:
This isn't knowledge of pro bono services, OK?

[00:03:38] Speaker 02:
and the word no doesn't merely describe pro bono services.

[00:03:42] Speaker 02:
I thought that was exactly the point of the site.

[00:03:45] Speaker 01:
That's an incorrect characterization.

[00:03:47] Speaker 01:
Why?

[00:03:48] Speaker 01:
That's what the board says it is, but that's not actually what it is.

[00:03:52] Speaker 01:
I'm asking you, what's inaccurate about it?

[00:03:55] Speaker 01:
It's not there to merely provide knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:03:59] Speaker 03:
The site, unlike a regular service.

[00:04:02] Speaker 03:
But at JA 41, this is your response to the initial office action, it says,

[00:04:07] Speaker 03:
quote, the site spreads knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:04:11] Speaker 03:
This is five lines down to the second paragraph.

[00:04:15] Speaker 03:
This is not the examining attorney, not the board, or not someone else.

[00:04:21] Speaker 03:
This is this applicant's attorney saying this.

[00:04:27] Speaker 03:
The site spreads knowledge of pro bono activity.

[00:04:29] Speaker 03:
That's correct.

[00:04:31] Speaker 03:
So OK, so then you agree.

[00:04:33] Speaker 03:
No, I don't agree.

[00:04:34] Speaker 03:
I don't agree.

[00:04:36] Speaker 03:
A combination of the word pro bono and no or knowledge is, in fact, why isn't that descriptive of a site that spreads knowledge of pro bono opportunities?

[00:04:47] Speaker 01:
Because I would submit that nobody in this room would look at the terms, the combination of the terms pro bono and no, and immediately think, oh, a website that provides knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:05:01] Speaker 01:
What they might think is a website that's related, that is about pro bono,

[00:05:06] Speaker 01:
and something else about knowing this, what that knowingness is, is unclear.

[00:05:11] Speaker 02:
On the face of it, it appears to be talking about pro bono knowledge and you describe it yourself as knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:05:20] Speaker 01:
That is not the primary purpose of the

[00:05:23] Speaker 01:
of the website.

[00:05:24] Speaker 01:
It's not simply a place to go to find out about pro bono opportunities.

[00:05:29] Speaker 03:
You're stuck with this quote.

[00:05:30] Speaker 03:
Whether you think it's right or wrong, this is what you told the agency.

[00:05:35] Speaker 03:
This is what you told the public when you wrote this into the prosecution history of the trademark application.

[00:05:40] Speaker 01:
This is one of several things that we told that pro bono LLC told the office, right?

[00:05:46] Speaker 01:
This is one of several possible interpretations of what pro bono could mean.

[00:05:52] Speaker 01:
Just when you see pro bono, yes, that could suggest to you, oh, a place where there's knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:05:58] Speaker 01:
Or it could just suggest what it actually is, which is a place where experienced attorneys can assist inexperienced attorneys in a pro bono case.

[00:06:09] Speaker 01:
So normally when you see a regular pro bono situation, you have an attorney, maybe a junior lawyer who doesn't have experience in a particular practice area, and they want to cut their teeth.

[00:06:18] Speaker 01:
in a particular area.

[00:06:19] Speaker 03:
This is not in the identification of the services.

[00:06:22] Speaker 03:
Exactly.

[00:06:23] Speaker 03:
Exactly.

[00:06:23] Speaker 03:
Well, then why are you talking about this whole notion of mentors and inexperienced lawyers and training ground for a mentor to train?

[00:06:33] Speaker 03:
It's not in the ID of your services in your trademark.

[00:06:35] Speaker 01:
And neither is the thing that you're trying to marry us to.

[00:06:39] Speaker 01:
Neither is a place where there is knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:06:42] Speaker 01:
Neither is that in the description of services.

[00:06:45] Speaker 01:
And that's the point.

[00:06:47] Speaker 01:
The description of services is operating an online marketplace for providers and consumers of free and affordable legal services.

[00:06:55] Speaker 01:
That is not a place where there is knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:06:59] Speaker 01:
That is not a place where more experienced lawyers can go.

[00:07:02] Speaker 03:
Well, why not?

[00:07:02] Speaker 03:
I guess that the idea is we've got a website here to opportunities for pro bono services for lawyers and clients or prospective clients to go to.

[00:07:16] Speaker 03:
meet up with each other, I guess, almost like a dating service on the internet.

[00:07:21] Speaker 03:
Why isn't that very, very consistent with the idea of this is a place where you can go to get knowledge about if I'm a client that needs help, pro bono lawyers?

[00:07:35] Speaker 03:
Or if I'm a pro bono lawyer where I can go to make myself available for pro bono work?

[00:07:41] Speaker 01:
It certainly suggests that.

[00:07:43] Speaker 01:
However, it doesn't immediately

[00:07:46] Speaker 01:
describe that, and that's the distinction.

[00:07:49] Speaker 03:
If the site was called pro-monum... Do you agree that the law is, when we're trying to make this inquiry about whether a proposed mark is descriptive or suggestive, we have to make that inquiry in the context of the identification of the goods and services listed in the trademark application?

[00:08:07] Speaker 03:
I do.

[00:08:08] Speaker 03:
Okay, so that's really the question.

[00:08:10] Speaker 03:
Your earlier arguments seemed to be

[00:08:13] Speaker 03:
raising the question of pro bono and no or pro bono and knowledge in a vacuum, what would that immediately convey to someone in the public?

[00:08:21] Speaker 03:
And that wouldn't be the correct inquiry.

[00:08:23] Speaker 03:
The correct inquiry is, if you see the word pro bono and no in the listed services of an online marketplace where lawyers and people in need can find each other for pro bono opportunities, then it starts.

[00:08:40] Speaker 03:
That's really the question, and that's where the board

[00:08:43] Speaker 03:
made the finding, you may not like it, but the board found, yes, they would see in this context that this mark is all about presenting knowledge about pro bono opportunities, just as you said in your trademark response in A441.

[00:09:00] Speaker 01:
But so is everything, every website.

[00:09:04] Speaker 01:
If that were the case, if you were to accept your position, you would not be able to have any no formative mark.

[00:09:12] Speaker 01:
Because then any no formative mark that then provided information about the other thing that composes the mark would be merely descriptive.

[00:09:19] Speaker 01:
But that's not the case.

[00:09:20] Speaker 01:
There are scores of registrations that sail through.

[00:09:24] Speaker 01:
Diagnosis for a service that provides diagnostic services.

[00:09:29] Speaker 01:
Porn, no.

[00:09:31] Speaker 01:
For a service that helps people who need knowledge in dealing with their porno addiction, there are tons and tons of no formative marks that are no different than this one.

[00:09:41] Speaker 01:
This is pro bono.

[00:09:42] Speaker 01:
The reason that the board refused it on the basis of mere descriptiveness is not because knowledge is merely descriptive.

[00:09:49] Speaker 01:
They just decided that the word pro bono conveys nothing other than the singular word pro bono spelled the way we all know it.

[00:09:57] Speaker 01:
They made no inquiry as to what pro bono and no means when combined.

[00:10:01] Speaker 03:
What if your mark was pro bono info?

[00:10:06] Speaker 03:
Would that be descriptive?

[00:10:08] Speaker 01:
I would say it would be much more descriptive than the combination of pro bono and no.

[00:10:14] Speaker 01:
What if the mark was pro bono no?

[00:10:17] Speaker 01:
What would that immediately describe to you?

[00:10:19] Speaker 01:
The answer is nothing.

[00:10:22] Speaker 01:
It might describe some pro bono services and then something else, something more.

[00:10:27] Speaker 03:
Again, I just want to try to tether you back to what the legal framework is.

[00:10:32] Speaker 03:
If it's not to ask ourselves what would someone understand the mark to mean in a vacuum,

[00:10:38] Speaker 03:
it's what would one understand and immediately convey or receive from the mark in the context of the identified goods and services in the application.

[00:10:50] Speaker 01:
Exactly.

[00:10:50] Speaker 01:
And when you look at the word P-R-O-B-O-K-N-O-W, right, and you look at that in connection with the services that are listed in the application, which is operating an online marketplace for providers and consumers

[00:11:03] Speaker 01:
of free and affordable legal services, one of the things you would immediately assume is that this is related to pro bono services, P-R-O-B-O-N-O.

[00:11:12] Speaker 01:
You would also wonder what the no means.

[00:11:16] Speaker 01:
Why is there also a no?

[00:11:17] Speaker 01:
What is the knowingness?

[00:11:19] Speaker 01:
It's certainly not identified in the description of services.

[00:11:22] Speaker 01:
And when you go to the website, it's certainly not immediately clear what the no is.

[00:11:26] Speaker 01:
The no is always separated in a different color.

[00:11:29] Speaker 01:
The use of pro bono in its regular

[00:11:31] Speaker 01:
uh... language p r o p on always use throughout it's clearly used differently than the mark pro bono you would want to know what the knowing this is and if you read the website as you much as you must do which the which the board insisted on in the government says you have to always look at the uh... services in the context of which are used which is the website in this case you would see that that not the knowledge that has been more experienced attorney can provide to a junior attorney in taking on these pro bono cases

[00:12:00] Speaker 01:
is what makes this different.

[00:12:02] Speaker 01:
That's what is trying to be suggested.

[00:12:05] Speaker 01:
We're not even trying to suggest the online marketplace for providers and consumers when we use the word no.

[00:12:12] Speaker 01:
It doesn't merely describe that.

[00:12:14] Speaker 01:
It doesn't necessarily suggest that.

[00:12:16] Speaker 01:
Perhaps it could.

[00:12:17] Speaker 01:
But there are many more things that it could suggest as well, including the thing that I just told you.

[00:12:21] Speaker 01:
And if you have a situation where a mark can have more than one interpretation, but no one in particular, then it is suggestive as a matter of law.

[00:12:31] Speaker 04:
So if it suggests, is this mark in use now?

[00:12:34] Speaker 01:
It is.

[00:12:34] Speaker 04:
Or is this an intent to use register?

[00:12:36] Speaker 01:
It was an intent to use mark.

[00:12:37] Speaker 01:
It has since been used.

[00:12:38] Speaker 01:
And everyone was notified of that.

[00:12:40] Speaker 04:
So that there would be, after actual use, there'd be an opportunity to demonstrate secondary meaning.

[00:12:48] Speaker 04:
That's right.

[00:12:49] Speaker 04:
And to overcome the concerns that have been raised.

[00:12:52] Speaker 04:
Is that your understanding?

[00:12:53] Speaker 01:
It's a possibility.

[00:12:54] Speaker 01:
And that would be fine, except for the fact that this is inherently distinctive.

[00:12:58] Speaker 01:
If you were to rule,

[00:12:59] Speaker 03:
Now inherently distinctive?

[00:13:02] Speaker 01:
That's what a suggestive mark is.

[00:13:03] Speaker 01:
It's inherently distinctive.

[00:13:04] Speaker 01:
That's the spectrum of marks.

[00:13:06] Speaker 01:
You have generic.

[00:13:08] Speaker 01:
Generic means it's the name of the thing.

[00:13:10] Speaker 01:
It's a chair.

[00:13:12] Speaker 01:
You can't have a mark chair for chairs.

[00:13:14] Speaker 01:
Merely descriptive means it immediately tells you what it is.

[00:13:16] Speaker 01:
Brown chairs.

[00:13:19] Speaker 03:
So this is a suggestive mark.

[00:13:21] Speaker 03:
Generally speaking, what does an applicant typically do in order to establish secondary meaning?

[00:13:27] Speaker 03:
Do they go out and take some kind of survey at a mall or something?

[00:13:30] Speaker 01:
It's possible.

[00:13:31] Speaker 01:
But you can also show five years of uninterrupted continuous use, advertising expenditures.

[00:13:38] Speaker 01:
There's a series of factors that you can use to show that.

[00:13:41] Speaker 01:
But in this case, there are other things you can look at to see whether or not something is either merely descriptive or suggestive.

[00:13:50] Speaker 01:
Under every test that this court and others have used to see if something is suggestive,

[00:13:54] Speaker 01:
This mark is.

[00:13:55] Speaker 01:
No one else uses the combination of pro bono and no in this way.

[00:13:59] Speaker 01:
Nobody's harmed by taking this out of the public domain.

[00:14:06] Speaker 01:
In the record, we submitted a Google search for the term pro bono, spelled as the mark is registered.

[00:14:15] Speaker 01:
Nothing came up.

[00:14:16] Speaker 01:
A restaurant came up for some guy.

[00:14:19] Speaker 01:
Nothing to do with pro bono legal services.

[00:14:22] Speaker 01:
No one is going to be

[00:14:23] Speaker 01:
harmed by giving the appellant the right to use this exclusively.

[00:14:29] Speaker 01:
Nobody's going to be prevented from using the word pro bono.

[00:14:32] Speaker 01:
Nobody's going to be prevented from using the word no.

[00:14:35] Speaker 01:
They're only going to be prevented from using the combination of pro bono and no together.

[00:14:39] Speaker 01:
This case is just like two cases that the board already decided, including the Muffins case, spelled M-U-F-F-U-N, which

[00:14:48] Speaker 01:
was suggestive of the fun aspect of the applicant's muffins.

[00:14:52] Speaker 01:
It was generic for muffins, but it suggested fun.

[00:14:56] Speaker 01:
The same with the tea and sympathy case was pharmacy.

[00:15:00] Speaker 01:
F-A-R-M-A-C-Y was the combination of farm and pharmacy.

[00:15:05] Speaker 01:
The board said it's merely descriptive because this is a pharmacy where you can go and you can get medicines and such.

[00:15:10] Speaker 01:
But the board said they made the right decision.

[00:15:12] Speaker 01:
They said, no, it's suggestive of the herbal,

[00:15:16] Speaker 01:
aspect of the things that you get there.

[00:15:18] Speaker 01:
These are farm fresh ingredients.

[00:15:20] Speaker 01:
So it's just clever enough to create a different commercial impression than just the pharmacy.

[00:15:26] Speaker 01:
That's what this is.

[00:15:27] Speaker 01:
Pro bono, spelled P-R-O-B-O-K-N-O-W, and with no distinguished in every instance, and with all lawyers and everyone knowing how to actually spell pro bono, is just clever enough to create a completely different commercial impression than just pro bono.

[00:15:43] Speaker 01:
And pro bono no.

[00:15:45] Speaker 01:
I'll just say one more time, means nothing.

[00:15:47] Speaker 01:
That is not merely descriptive of anything.

[00:15:50] Speaker 01:
If you said, oh, I have a service that's pro bono, no, we do stuff, we help each other with pro bono things, that wouldn't mean, you wouldn't say, oh yeah, that's exactly what I was thinking.

[00:15:59] Speaker 01:
As soon as you said pro bono, no, that's exactly what I was thinking.

[00:16:02] Speaker 01:
You'd never say that because you weren't thinking that.

[00:16:04] Speaker 01:
It could be any number of things.

[00:16:06] Speaker 01:
And if something can mean any number of things,

[00:16:09] Speaker 01:
It's suggested.

[00:16:10] Speaker 03:
In the context of the identified services in the trademark?

[00:16:13] Speaker 01:
100%.

[00:16:13] Speaker 01:
Pro bono no does not mean operating.

[00:16:17] Speaker 01:
I mean, it does not.

[00:16:18] Speaker 01:
It just simply does not immediately describe somebody who operates an online marketplace for providers and consumers of affordable legal services.

[00:16:25] Speaker 01:
It simply does not.

[00:16:27] Speaker 01:
OK.

[00:16:29] Speaker 04:
Let's hear from the office.

[00:16:35] Speaker 04:
Mr. Hickman.

[00:16:37] Speaker 00:
Thank you, Your Honor.

[00:16:38] Speaker 00:
May it please the court.

[00:16:40] Speaker 00:
The test for descriptiveness is whether consumers would immediately understand that the mark describes a feature, function, or characteristic of the goods or services with which the mark is to be registered.

[00:16:53] Speaker 00:
Here, as the court has already observed this morning, we have the mark probono, which is pronounced identically to the ordinary spelling of the word probono.

[00:17:01] Speaker 03:
I guess porno got registered.

[00:17:03] Speaker 03:
I mean, I hate to bring this up, but that got registered, but probono doesn't get registered.

[00:17:10] Speaker 03:
Can you shed some light on that?

[00:17:15] Speaker 00:
I would dare say, Your Honor, that the commercial impression of porno is probably slightly different than pro bono.

[00:17:23] Speaker 00:
But the rule, which is well established in this court, is that even if we can point to maybe one or two or even multiple registrations that the office approved before, that could arguably

[00:17:36] Speaker 00:
would arguably be similar to the one under consideration, that what we have to focus on is the one that was before the board and that is before this court here.

[00:17:45] Speaker 00:
And the court had a very well fleshed out record.

[00:17:50] Speaker 00:
It had the applicant's website here, which shows that the very focus of the online marketplace is to connect clients and lawyers and to provide them information about access to pro bono services.

[00:18:04] Speaker 00:
There's no other way.

[00:18:06] Speaker 04:
But the board didn't find that it was generic.

[00:18:09] Speaker 04:
Is that right?

[00:18:09] Speaker 04:
So how would you classify this rejection, since it's not generic?

[00:18:15] Speaker 04:
Is it descriptive, merely descriptive, suggestive, or what?

[00:18:21] Speaker 00:
It's merely descriptive, Your Honor.

[00:18:24] Speaker 00:
That is correct.

[00:18:26] Speaker 04:
So it's merely descriptive.

[00:18:27] Speaker 04:
There's an opportunity through use to establish an association with this source.

[00:18:33] Speaker 04:
Is that right?

[00:18:34] Speaker 00:
That's correct.

[00:18:35] Speaker 00:
And as my opposing counsel acknowledged, there is the possibility of coming back after five years of continuous use and showing the office evidence of acquired distinctiveness.

[00:18:46] Speaker 00:
And it may be possible at that point to obtain the registration.

[00:18:51] Speaker 00:
But here what we have today is the descriptiveness refusal.

[00:18:54] Speaker 00:
And I think the court

[00:18:58] Speaker 00:
I'm as aware of the evidence and we think it's a good record.

[00:19:01] Speaker 00:
And so unless there are any other specific questions, I'm happy to stand on the briefs and yield the balance of my time.

[00:19:12] Speaker 04:
OK.

[00:19:12] Speaker 04:
Any questions?

[00:19:13] Speaker 04:
Any more questions?

[00:19:15] Speaker 04:
Good.

[00:19:15] Speaker 04:
Thank you, Mr. Hickman.

[00:19:17] Speaker 04:
Well, Mr. Schopper, you have a couple of minutes to use your rebuttal time, but you get the last word.

[00:19:23] Speaker 01:
Yeah, I appreciate it.

[00:19:26] Speaker 01:
It was pretty remarkable to me.

[00:19:28] Speaker 01:
The record, if they want to stand on, doesn't have anything that supports their position.

[00:19:35] Speaker 01:
As you said, there's no dispute.

[00:19:37] Speaker 01:
There are two words that make up this mark, pro bono and no.

[00:19:40] Speaker 01:
The only evidence that the board relied on was evidence of the what pro bono, the word we all know, means.

[00:19:47] Speaker 01:
Dictionary definitions of the word pro bono.

[00:19:50] Speaker 01:
Online definitions of the word pro bono.

[00:19:52] Speaker 04:
But they're not saying that it's generic.

[00:19:56] Speaker 01:
No, they're saying it's merely descriptive because pro bono, the word pro bono is merely descriptive of a characteristic of the services.

[00:20:03] Speaker 01:
That's what they're saying.

[00:20:05] Speaker 01:
And so they relied on only evidence of the word pro bono.

[00:20:08] Speaker 01:
No evidence of the word no.

[00:20:11] Speaker 01:
No evidence of the word pro bono and no together.

[00:20:14] Speaker 03:
When I saw the briefs here and then I looked at the cover of your blue brief, it said to me, in re probach now,

[00:20:25] Speaker 03:
And I said, I wonder what in rape, there must be an inventor named Mr. Pro Bok now.

[00:20:30] Speaker 03:
And then I said, oh, this is a trademark case.

[00:20:33] Speaker 03:
And I said, oh, it's not in rape pro Bok now.

[00:20:39] Speaker 03:
It's in rape pro bono.

[00:20:41] Speaker 01:
Exactly.

[00:20:41] Speaker 03:
And so I guess that made me wonder, why didn't you argue?

[00:20:46] Speaker 01:
We did.

[00:20:48] Speaker 03:
This is take some kind of visual and mental adjustment to go from,

[00:20:56] Speaker 03:
pro-Bach now to pro-bono.

[00:21:00] Speaker 03:
Yeah, we did.

[00:21:01] Speaker 03:
You did?

[00:21:02] Speaker 03:
Where did you do that?

[00:21:02] Speaker 03:
I didn't see that.

[00:21:03] Speaker 03:
Well, I can point you exactly where it's in our... No, I mean, I saw right out of the gate in the initial response to the office action, it was, this is a combination of two words, pro-bono and knowledge.

[00:21:15] Speaker 03:
And everybody's going to know that.

[00:21:16] Speaker 03:
Everybody's going to see that.

[00:21:18] Speaker 03:
And when they see that, they're going to see that it's not merely descriptive, but only suggestive of

[00:21:25] Speaker 03:
getting knowledge of pro bono opportunities.

[00:21:27] Speaker 03:
That was the focus of the argument straight through the prosecution.

[00:21:31] Speaker 03:
I don't see anywhere where the applicant said, when you look at this, it says pro boc now.

[00:21:39] Speaker 01:
Ironically, we're doing this case pro bono, and we took it after the prosecution, after the board refusal.

[00:21:46] Speaker 01:
And the very first thing we put in our opening brief was exactly as you just described.

[00:21:53] Speaker 01:
If you don't know

[00:21:54] Speaker 03:
what it is when you first hear... Okay, but you can't argue new arguments on appeal.

[00:21:57] Speaker 03:
That's, like, the classic... Well, it's not a new argument.

[00:22:01] Speaker 01:
It's not a new argument in the sense that they said that this mark was suggestive, not descriptive.

[00:22:08] Speaker 01:
The only way that you know that it's pronounced pro bono is to recognize the word no.

[00:22:16] Speaker 01:
That's what they said during the prosecution.

[00:22:18] Speaker 03:
When you say they, that means you.

[00:22:20] Speaker 01:
That's what our client said.

[00:22:21] Speaker 01:
That means you.

[00:22:22] Speaker 01:
That's what our clients said during prosecution.

[00:22:24] Speaker 01:
The only way to recognize, and the only way that the board could find that this mark is merely descriptive, is to recognize that K-N-O-W is pronounced no.

[00:22:33] Speaker 01:
So if you don't recognize that, you're exactly right.

[00:22:36] Speaker 01:
It'll say in re probac now, and it'll be probac now, and that'll be arbitrary, because that means nothing.

[00:22:41] Speaker 01:
But if you do recognize that it says no, that it's pronounced no, then you will know that it's not simply pro bono.

[00:22:48] Speaker 01:
It's not simply the merely descriptive word

[00:22:51] Speaker 01:
pro bono, it's something more than that.

[00:22:53] Speaker 01:
It's a combination of the words pro bono and no.

[00:22:55] Speaker 01:
And that combination is not merely descriptive of the services or what they actually, either in their application or what they're actually providing on their website in real life.

[00:23:05] Speaker 01:
Thank you very much.

[00:23:06] Speaker 04:
Thank you.

[00:23:07] Speaker 04:
Thank you both.

[00:23:07] Speaker 04:
The case is taken under submission.