I HOPE THE USPTO NOTICED THIS: According to the Royal Gazette, approximately 13,500 registered trademarks in Bermuda have been lost from the computerized Trademark Registry following a crash. A back-up system which is supposed to rebuild the database failed, meaning only half of the computerized information was restored. Staff at the Registry General are pulling the original files to manually input all data since 1999.

The failure occurred about three weeks ago and it has forced the Registry General to suspend processing of new trademark registrations. So far, lawyers acting for companies which have registered their trademarks can’t search the system to see if their intellectual property has been protected. Registry General staff are hoping to have basic service resumed in two weeks.

(Insert your "Bermude Triangle" joke here)

- IPKat also has some comments regarding this comically tragic event.