Every week, The Competitive Insight lists the Utah patents and trademarks pursued by Utah businesses.  I'll be giving recognition to the most interesting ones that come across my desk.  Here's my favorites from this week.

Patent of the Week

7,283,230

Semiconductor forensic light kit

Calvin D. Ostler, Riverton, UT; Densen Cao, Sandy, UT; Hongyan Li, Sandy, UT; Zhaohui Lin, Salt Lake City, UT

CAO Group, Inc, West Jordan, UT

There's something about a flashlight that gives you a CSI-investigative feeling.  Especially one that lets you detect blood, saliva, body fluids, hair and human skin damage (although other chemicals may be required).  This is like the ultimately cool-flashlight.  Imagine that grade-school sleepover that you had, telling ghost stories.  You'd whip out this uber-flashlight, examining your house for the tell-tale secrets of the stories that you just repeated.  You'd come across that carpet spot from a late-night bloody nose months or years ago and see it fluoresce.  That would be the proof needed to send the eight young witnesses to the parents room at 2am with a request to move/call the police.  Yeah, my kids won't be getting one anytime soon.

Trademark of the Week

WE TALK BACK!

Phone Directories Company, LP; Phone Directories Company Inc.; SEP Directory Holdings, LLC

Orem, UT

So, while this isn't directly related to human harm, it does seem to relate to computer harm.  I'm not sure about in Ogden, but in my house growing up, we weren't allowed to "talk back" to my parents.  Talking back, of course, meant being rude and difficult.  If my electronic phone directory "talked back," I might be tempted to do something rash to that directory like this.  Moral of the story is that if you choose a trademark, don't let it have a negative connotation unless its funny.