Could You Be Sued for Saying a Common Word or Phrase?

Do you have a favorite phrase that you like to say a lot? Now imagine liking your favorite phrase so much that you would want to prevent other people from using your preferred words by trademarking those words!

Celebrities and companies have trademarked words and expressions that you’ve heard in movies and advertisements. Some of these words are so common that you might wonder if you could get in trouble with the law for innocently saying an everyday word or phrase.

Interestingly, it is possible to trademark commonly used words and phrases, such as apple. Apple, the company, can’t trademark “apple” if they’re selling fruit products. But they are selling devices such as computers and phones, not edible products related to fruit. 

Similarly, you can’t trademark the word “pencil” if you want to sell pencil products. But you could trademark “pencil” if you wanted to sell, for example, sofas or gardening tools under the name “pencil.” For more on trademarking common words, check out this post.

You might be surprised that an expression as common as “Merry Christmas” is trademarked. With Christmas around the corner, you might wonder if you, as a business owner, can write “Merry Christmas” on your custom-designed T-shirt that you’re selling on Etsy. Or if you can write Merry Christmas on the homemade card you’re going to give to your family.

Fortunately, you can write “Merry Christmas” on the products that you are making because you’re wishing someone a certain feeling. However, you can’t use “Merry Christmas” on certain food products, decorations, cigar products, and types of clothes… if you’re using them as a type of trademark for your business.

So you don’t have to worry about infringing trademarks on common, everyday words unless you’re thinking of creating and marketing a product using a trademarked word or phrase. 

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How to Make Money in MLM… the Real Story

It’s time to bring back an old post I made about making money in MLM. In the last few years, I’ve seen more articles and social media posts about people promoting their MLM, or people asking if a job post is an MLM scam.

If you’re interested in the real facts about whether you can make money in an MLM, read this post on How to Make Money in MLM.

The Cheapest Way to Upgrade Your Home Office

At first, it seemed like he was attending the Zoom meeting from an exotic tropic location. The window to his office was wide open, the palm trees behind him swaying to the breeze and his curtains brushing against him where he sat at his desk.

Technology has become so advanced that you don’t need fancy office furniture to work from home. You need a solid computer to work remotely and a reliable internet connection. Those are the bare minimum.

These days, even if you can’t afford to work from anywhere in the world of remote work, you can at least look like you can afford to work from anywhere. And you can upgrade your office anytime using the latest features of virtual meetings.

Back to the office worker working in the tropics. Virtual backgrounds have become so advanced now that the background has movement and sound. It’s harder now to separate you from the virtual background behind you. Curtains can sway forward so close they seem to touch your arm, appearing as if you truly are in the fake room.

The key to the illusion, however, is to move as little as possible. Movement destroys the fantasy. When you move quickly, people can almost see the real background behind you because technology can’t compensate fast enough. (So sit still while others admire your fantastic office location.) 

Virtual backgrounds are the new way to upgrade the furniture in your home office. Your computer and internet are necessary for remote work, but you can decide how much you want to “spend” on your office furniture and the building itself. Do you want to be located in an open office space in a building? Hold a meeting in your glass condo with a view? Sit in a coffee shop full of people? The choices are limitless.

However, life gets interesting when you always have virtual meetings from the same polished, immaculate home office, and one day you’re too lazy to turn on your background. You reveal your actual home office backdrop: a messy kitchen with items strewn all over the counter and your fancy desk is the kitchen table. The contrast from your usual setup can be jarring and revealing. (Maybe too revealing.)

Welcome to the modern world of remote work and virtual backgrounds. The magic of technology can save you money. You can really “dress to impress” by finding the perfect work location for yourself. 

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5 Tips on Working for a Virtual StartUp

Nowadays, it’s possible to go to an office address and find that the company you’re looking for doesn’t physically exist there. At all. Technology has enabled the employees of an entire company to work from home. 

Some of these companies are startups that are 100 percent virtual. These companies are great if you hate commuting and love working in your own space. But, as startups, they also have their drawbacks.

Keep these five tips in mind if you’re thinking of working for a 100% remote startup company. These tips can improve your success at working for such a company in the long term.

1 Believe in the mission and vision

Look into the company’s mission and vision before you go to your job interview. The company’s goals should completely line up with yours. Of course, you want to work for a company with a purpose you believe in. With a startup, it is even more crucial that you aren’t working for the paycheque. Here’s why.

Startups are start-ups. The journey can be bumpy as the company experiences growing pains. Roles for each person may constantly change. Policies and procedures may frequently update as the company tries to determine what works and what doesn’t. Even the company’s products and services may change as it adjusts to become a better fit for its ideal customers. 

If the company’s goals are goals you fully support, it makes the constant shifting and adjusting easier to bear.

2 Be flexible and open to change

If you’re going to work for a startup, you absolutely must embrace change. As the company grows at a rapid pace, more people will join the team. Roles and responsibilities will shift. You may find yourself working with more team members or find yourself managing a team. You may have more tasks on your to-do list. Or you may have fewer, more specialized tasks as your role becomes more defined.

Procedures may also improve and change over time as the company experiments with different types of software. Instead of tracking your hours on a simple spreadsheet or table, you now need to learn to use customer management software (CRM software) such as Salesforce. Instead of casually mentioning in a chat that you finished a task, you’ll need to write your update in a project management tool, such as Trello, Asana, or Click Up.

3 Take initiative

A startup company is still figuring out many things. Just picture a company that is settling into its office on moving day. Office equipment and office furniture are everywhere as people try to figure out where everyone will sit and what will go in each room.

Some startups don’t have a human resources (HR) department or a clear line of authority. In these cases, you may need to be more assertive than you’re comfortable with. For example, if the person you report to is disrespectful to you, you’ll need to figure out who you could talk to about your boss. Similarly, without an HR, you won’t have someone to speak to about disrespectful treatment by a coworker. You will also have to take initiative about getting a raise because the company is still figuring out what the pay raises, bonuses, and benefits should be.

4 Be prepared to put in extra hours and effort

Working for a startup could mean working extra hours and putting in more effort. Depending on how established the startup is, the company may require you to work longer days to get procedures set up. They may be short staffed, so you’ll find yourself taking on the role of more than one person.

At some companies, they will appreciate the extra effort and reward you with a promotion, such as a change in job title or responsibilities, or better pay. At other companies, particularly those that aren’t well organized, your extra effort will be required but will go unnoticed. They will expect you to work weekends and evenings in addition to regular office hours.  

5 Invest in yourself

If you’re working for a virtual startup, you may feel a bit disconnected, especially if you’re a social extrovert. You may only know the person who brought you into the company after the job interview. You’ll also know the people who you work with regularly. But everyone else will be just a name in a chat group. You don’t get to meet people casually in the hallway or during lunch break. 

The people you work with may not remember to introduce you to key members of the team or remember to show you how to use the software you’ll need. 

It’s up to you to reach out and remind them of your skills if you want a promotion or pay raise. Your supervisor may not remember these details, especially if the team has been growing and your supervisor has changed and there is no HR department. 

Learning new skills is important, especially when it comes to technology. No one from the IT Department is going to knock on your door to help you set up your computer or connect to your internet. If you lose your internet connection or your computer breaks down, you lose your lifeline to your virtual job. 

Key Takeaways

Not all startups are the same. Leadership affects how the company treats its employees. If there is strong leadership, the startup will grow quickly while providing the support that each person needs. People will feel acknowledged and appreciated for their work. If you’re considering working for a virtual startup, be prepared to put in extra effort and be ready for rapid and constant change.

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How Modern Clocks Replaced Two Jobs

Jobs and Tech

Which type of person are you? Do you jump out of bed, eager to start the day, when your alarm goes off? Or do you do what it takes to shut off your alarm, curses and hand slamming included? 

No matter which type you are, you likely had that alarm set because you needed to be somewhere in the morning, and you needed your alarm clock to stop you from sleeping in. Imagine life without your alarm clock. If you forget to set your clocks back or ahead for daylight savings, your computer or phone does it for you, leaving one less excuse to be late for work.

Now let’s turn the clocks back (so to speak) to years ago, when clocks weren’t as reliable as they are now. Workers needed people, not tech, to help them get up on time in the morning. Back then, people could get a job to help people keep time.

knocker-uppers

Years ago, people either didn’t have reliable alarm clocks or couldn’t afford a clock. They also couldn’t be late for work. During the Industrial Revolution, being on time for work was crucial.

In some European countries, workers paid a knocker-up, also called a knocker-upper, to wake them up on time. The knocker-upper used a baton or stick to tap on the worker’s window to wake that person up. In some cases, they would tap the window several times, and in other cases, they would continue to tap until they were sure their client was awake.

It wasn’t just the working class that employed knocker-uppers. Wealthy families would employ them to knock non-stop at their window until they woke up. Other knocker-uppers used straws to shoot peas at clients’ windows.

Shooting peas (and being paid to do so) sounds like fun for people of any age, but of course there’s a catch. A person doing this job needs to be a night owl who is willing to stay up and work at night. Most knocker-uppers were elderly men and women. Some were police constables who took on this side gig during early morning patrols.

clock keepers

Another job created because people couldn’t rely on their clocks was the role of clock keeper. Back in Middle Age Europe, clock keepers were paid a lot of money to make sure that the clock or clocks in their care were keeping time accurately.

A clock keeper may have been employed by one person, such as the owner of a manor, or a group of people, such as an entire town. Regulating the town clock was a huge responsibility. Similarly, maintaining the clock of a monastery was an important job. The church’s schedule and rituals relied on that clock.

Key Takeaways

The need for a clock keeper with excellent math skills is no longer required today. We also don’t require someone to tap on our windows to tell us it’s time to get up for work. We expect that our clocks and alarm clocks are reliable.

Modern inventions have replaced these two jobs, but they have created other jobs for people to create better time-keeping devices.

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