The TMR Reports on Bad Faith, Unfair Competition, Secondary Liability, and TTAB Practice

The July–August 2026 (Vol. 116, No. 4) issue of The Trademark Reporter (TMR), INTA’s flagship law journal, is now available online. This issue continues the TMR’s century-plus tradition of offering practitioners and scholars a range of content and a diversity of viewpoints—from practitioner-focused pieces to new thought leadership.

Brand owners doing business in Türkiye will benefit from the insights on bad faith trademark applications offered by returning TMR author Uğur Aktekin and new TMR authors Selin Bilik and Bilge Ayperi Kemer in Evaluation of Bad Faith in Trademark Applications Under Turkish Trademark Law.

In Trademarks, Functionality, and Competition, returning TMR author Glynn S. Lunney, Jr. argues that because trademark law’s primary objective is to ensure competition, a product feature valued by consumers for its own sake (regardless of the source) is functional and not entitled to trademark protection.

Brand owners should be aware of the potential risks to established principles of secondary liability in the trademark context posed by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision earlier this year in Cox Communications, Inc. v. Sony Music Entertainment, as examined in depth by returning TMR author David H. Bernstein and new TMR authors Megan K. Bannigan, Christopher S. Ford, Kathryn C. Saba, and Anna M. Rennich in Rethinking Contributory Trademark Infringement After Cox Communications.

And TMR author Leigha R. Santoro returns with a review of A Legal Strategist’s Guide to Trademark Trial and Appeal Board Practice (Theodore H. Davis, Jr., editor) and finds it to be a comprehensive and useful resource for those practicing before the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.

For more information and to read prior TMR issues—including the 2026 editions of the United States Annual Review and the Annual Review of European Trademark Law—please visit the TMR’s microsite.

Although every effort has been made to verify the accuracy of this article, readers are urged to check independently on matters of specific concern or interest.

© 2026 International Trademark Association