It turns out that we may not have to fear hearing “Dude, you’re getting a Cloud Computer®!” in the future after all.

Bill Poser noted on Language Log that the US Patent and Trademark Office has refused Dell’s application to register the term cloud computing as a trademark. In a office action report, the USPTO said:

“Registration is refused because the applied-for mark merely describes a feature and characteristic of applicant’s services. … As shown in the attached Internet and LEXISNEXIS® evidence, CLOUD COMPUTING is a descriptive term of art in the relevant industry.”

Related posts:

1. Dell trying to trademark cloud computing
2. Can cloud computing be entirely trusted?
3. Put cloud computing in your shopping cart
4. Cloud computing with Hadoop
5. Frontiers of Multicore Computing at UMBC, 26-28 Aug 2008