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Stockwell & Smedley, PSC, Lexington, KY (2026)

12/19/2024

You can never be too secure, especially when it comes to your financial assets. Estate planning is a legal process that helps secure the future of your assets or liabilities for the next generation through thoughtful planning and decisions. When developing a plan, seek legal help and/or consider these seven aspects:

- Review insurance benefits
- Identify potential beneficiaries
- Create a Living Will
- Understand powers of attorney
- Finalize a Will
- Develop a Living Trust
- Review current tax laws

Read more on you can create your own peace of mind and secure your assets for generations to come through thoughtful estate planning:

Your estate might not be worth hundreds of millions, but it is worth something, and it’s certainly worth a thoughtful and comprehensive estate plan. To properly complete your estate planning, it’s imperative to understand that your estate comprises everything you own, from real property, land, a...

12/10/2024

Writing your will is not your final act, but a new beginning for those you hold dear. In estate planning, a will is the first step to ensure your assets are distributed the way you want them but can be difficult on loved ones if you don't check all the boxes. In some cases, a will can become probated, a court-supervised process which assets are distributed, that can lead to years of deliberation and costly fees. However, naming beneficiaries on financial accounts and creating a living trust can save your family hardships. Excerpt below:

"With a living trust, a third-party trustee manages the assets that are put into it. The decedent has more control over who gets what and when, and is useful for those with a significant amount of wealth. For example, if an account holder has assets worth tens of millions of dollars, they may want to spread out when children or other inheritors receive the money. The trustee, meanwhile, invests and administers the account according to the decedent's instructions."

If you have any questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com and contact us directly for a free consultation.
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https://fortune.com/2024/09/01/why-the-first-step-in-your-estate-planning-process-shouldnt-be-crafting-a-will/

And why the first step in your estate planning process shouldn't be crafting a will.

11/26/2024

Branding is a company's distinct identity formed from words, symbols, or phrases that resonate with a key audience. If this branding changes or is forced to change due to legal troubles, it can have a significant impact on how customers view a company. When protecting a company's branding it is key to understand trademarks so you or no-one else takes away from what makes your business special. Using the USPTO's new website, you can check your company's trademarks or validate a potential trademark in a short few minutes. Here are a few tips to save you future headaches on trademarks:

- 🏷️ Trademarks prevent brand confusion, crucial for maintaining your business reputation and brand.

- 📊 Use the USPTO’s advanced search features, filtering by classes relevant to your products (like clothing), to find pertinent trademarks easily.
- ❓ Legal Advice Limitations: Always consult a lawyer for specific cases. Misunderstanding trademark laws can lead to costly mistakes.
- 🔄 When in doubt, create original phrases rather than relying on existing phrases to minimize infringement risk.
- 🖋️ Quotes and Celebrity Names: These are often protected by copyright, even if not trademarked, so avoid using them in your designs.

If you have any questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com and contact us directly for a free consultation.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3f4QctA7Veg

🌟 New USPTO Trademark Checking Website: A Comprehensive Guide for Protecting Your Print on Demand Business 🌟🔍 Recently Updated USPTO Site? Learn How to Na...

11/08/2024

Like bourbon, horses are not only a mascot for the bluegrass, but they also pull more than their hefty weight in revenue. And like bourbon, there are many flavors of horse interest, and so branding is an essential component in the machinery that makes the whole thing move. The following is just a passing glance into the world of horses in Kentucky, but it gives us a small picture of the way branding (not the fiery hot kind) helps prop up this gargantuan industry.
You can read more about how horse racing came to the Bluegrass State and how it's branding has changed to benefit its assets in the last 100 years, here:
https://www.stockwell-law.com/resources/horses-and-kentucky-how-the-industry-came-to-the-bluegrass-part-3
If you have any specific questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com.

Churchill Downs, the most famous of all, is known primarily for the Kentucky Derby, which is the center of the horse universe not just in Kentucky, but worldwide. It’s no surprise then that its logo reflects an awareness of this most obvious and deserved point of pride. It’s a tastefully sparse,...

10/30/2024

AI has been the center for developments in copyrights over the past few years. With the ruling that AI art cannot be copyrighted, are the legal protections still clear? Recently, artist Jason Allen is asking the federal court to overturn its decision of AI copyrights based on artwork he created using generative AI. He claims that he has a specific, original idea and spent dozens of hours inputting creative prompts into the platform as well as photoshop, to create the work. Excerpt below:

"Allen's lawsuit could set a precedent for how AI is used in other creative works like art, music and film. This is not the first time federal courts have wrestled with the question of who owns AI-generated content... Allen told the office that he created the art with the generative AI system Mid Journey by testing hundreds of prompt iterations, and altered it with Adobe Photoshop. The office rejected Allen's application after he refused to disclaim the parts of the image that Midjourney generated."

This decision will be another test the legal ruling that will transform the landscape of copyright law if overturned. If you have any questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com and contact us directly for a free consultation.
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https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/artist-sues-after-us-rejects-copyright-ai-generated-image-2024-09-26/

Artist Jason M. Allen asked a Colorado federal court on Thursday to reverse a U.S. Copyright Office decision that rejected copyright protection for an award-winning image he created with artificial intelligence.

10/14/2024

Money doesn't grow on trees, but your Kentucky small business could get government grants to help their business. Currently, small businesses in the commonwealth can still apply for up to $25,000 in tax credits designed to grow businesses through the Kentucky Small Business Tax Credit (KSBTC) program. These credits are available to eligible companies that added at least one net new full-time employee and invested $5,000 or more in qualifying equipment or technology within the past 24 months. This initiative aims to support businesses that are expanding or starting new projects, helping them offset costs associated with hiring and investment. Excerpt below:
"This year alone, the KSBTC program has spurred small business owners to invest more than $2.1 million in their companies, awarding over $760,000 in tax credits and creating 222 new, Kentucky jobs. Since its inception, KSBTC has assisted in creating over 4,300 new jobs, generated more than $44 million in investments into small businesses and allocated over $14.7 million in total tax credits."
If you have any questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com and contact us directly for a free consultation.
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https://nkytribune.com/2024/09/kentucky-small-businesses-creating-jobs-investing-in-communities-can-still-apply-for-tax-credits/

Gov. Andy Beshear encouraged Kentucky’s small businesses creating jobs and investing in our communities to apply for a tax credit of up to $25,000 through the Kentucky Small Business Tax Credit (KSBTC). To receive the Kentucky Small Business Tax Credit, qualifying small businesses should apply now...

08/30/2024

Inventors can emerge from the most unlikely places. 82nd Training Support Squadron Senior Airman Isaiah Demillo has devoted his life to his country and making processes better for his Air Force program. Recently, he put his problem solving skills to the test when he created a new belt that can be used as a tourniquet in battle. The belt can be worn with OCPs and is designed to be self-applied, which can be the difference between life and death in many situations facing miltiary members. Except below:

"To build the prototype, Demillo went to experts at different training entities in the wing. After designing the DRT, he went to the 361st TRS, where aircrew flight equipment specialists helped sew the parts together. Demillo built a computer-aided drafting file for the buckle/windlass tourniquet part of the belt and experts in Training Development 3D printed it."

If you have any specific questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com.

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An Airman at Sheppard Air Force Base patented a design and produced a prototype for a tourniquet belt with the help of a Spark Cell, patent lawyers at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and specialists

08/28/2024

In May, world leaders of the World Intellectual Property Organization gathered to unanimously approve a treaty to streamline the efficacy, transparency, and quality of patents and patent prosecution between countries. The treaty looks to provide more protection from copycat patents and generic ideas that have already been established. Except below:

"According to the new Treaty, where a claimed invention in a patent application is based on genetic resources, each contracting party shall require applicants to disclose the country of origin or source of the genetic resources. Where the claimed invention in a patent application is based on traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources, each contracting party shall require applicants to disclose the indigenous peoples or local community, as applicable, who provided the traditional knowledge."

What does this mean for you? At the moment, if you do not have any company relations in the 15 countries named as apart of the treaty, nothing. But this can signal more to come for intellectual property rights on the global stage. If you have any specific questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com.

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Member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) approved a groundbreaking new treaty relating to intellectual property, genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge on F...

08/26/2024

AI's generative capabilities have opened more moral and intellectual property issues than were anticipated in the last few years. But what constitutes direct copyright infringement from AI? Currently, there is no established case law for AI's generative capabilities, with some experts stating that it has to be substantially similar to the original or derived art, while others think that its work inherently differs enough under fair use precedents. Excerpt below:
"Overall, AI is changing copyright law. It is causing the legal system to define what constitutes authorship and how to protect human-generated content even if it contains AI-generated content... In the U.S., the Copyright Office guidance states that works containing AI-generated content are not copyrightable without evidence that a human author contributed creatively. New laws can help clarify the level of human contribution needed to protect works containing AI-generated content."

If you have any specific questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com.

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To produce AI-generated content, copyright issues should be top of mind. Discover the current copyright laws on AI and lawsuits that could change them.

08/23/2024

The invention and patenting of life saving therapies has traditionally been done by researchers in labs, working to find the right compounds to treat diseases. In the modern era, researchers are using AI to identify new molecules at a rapid rate that may be used to cure specific human conditions. Now there are new insights to patenting AI founded treatments that have had little-to-no regulations before, excerpt below:
"AI-assisted inventions are patentable if a human made a “significant” contribution. What constitutes a “significant” contribution isn’t explicitly defined—though the patent office has provided some guiding principles, and a clearer picture will develop through case law. Either way, regulators have made at least two things clear when it comes to AI-assisted inventions: There must be a human inventor on every claim in a patent, and the USPTO inventorship analysis will focus on human contributions, not whether AI was used in the conception."
These guidelines now limit inventors that want to patent every generated molecule and create a more level playing field for competing research.

If you have any specific questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com.

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AI is vaulting drug discovery forward leaps and bounds—and now regulators are beginning to catch up, with the United States Patent and Trademark Office recently issuing new guidelines on the patentability of AI-assisted inventions.

08/21/2024

Single barrel bourbon, a personalized bourbon bottled from one individual barrel, is a staple of every bourbon distributor across the country today. Customers are enticed by the personalized taste of a single barrel bourbon that better fits their preferred tastes, However, this was not always the case. Over several hundred years, spirit producers have adjusted their branding to create products for customers that promote a one-of-a-kind taste, with little-to-no product diversification. The single barrel bourbon revolutionized the way liquor companies marketed products and branded their companies to reach new audiences with new, unique flavors. Read more on how your business can learn from bourbon's evolution of branding: https://bit.ly/3FkEYpS

If you have any specific questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com.

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Single barrel bourbon, bottled from one individual barrel, is now a staple of nearly every bourbon brand’s repertoire. The distinction between a single barrel bourbon and a blended one is vast. Bourbon’s color, and much of its flavor, comes from the barrel in which it is aged. As such, two barre...

08/19/2024

Thinking of a new payment model for your small business? In recent years, companies have been implementing payment plans for customers to "buy now, pay later". These plans usually have zero to little interest, so it is seen as an accommodating model for customers that are making large purchase orders that fit their needs. However, small business need to be wary of customers that may look to take advantage of loop holes in the system. Except below:

"If something goes wrong, consumers could blame the small business — even if they have nothing to do with the payment plan. And things can go wrong. A report from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in 2022 found that more than 13% of BNPL transactions involved a disputed charge or a return. In 2021, consumers disputed or returned $1.8 billion in transactions at five large BNPL firms, the CFPB said. That means consumers have legal protections including the rights to dispute charges, easily get a refund directly from the lender for a returned item, and get billing statements."

If you have any specific questions or inquiries regarding your own intellectual property, please visit our website at www.stockwell-law.com.

https://bit.ly/46FKEI3
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“Buy now, pay later” services are a popular way that shoppers pay for goods. Because shoppers like the service, offering it can be a plus for a small business. But

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Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm