The 5x4 layout seems pretty unremarkable -- should each phone manufacturer have to trademark their own layout (n,m), for nonzero integers n,m? Will small players be forced to adopt button grids like 21x1 if they can't license actually-usable arrangements?
I don't think it's reasonable that a simple silhouette of a phone, used as an icon to represent a phone, is trademarkable. The color is more interesting, until you look at wikipedia and see that mobile phones were using almost the exact same iconography -- phone silhouette over light green background -- at least as far back as 1989:
>I don't think it's reasonable that a simple silhouette of a phone, used as an icon to represent a phone, is trademarkable.
Trademarks are an interesting case, though. You can trademark common ideas, especially if you're the first one to get the trademark for that specific use. They're extremely focused in that they can only be used in a specific way. MS' trademarks on Windows and Word, for example, only apply to operating systems and word processors.
I don't think it's reasonable that a simple silhouette of a phone, used as an icon to represent a phone, is trademarkable. The color is more interesting, until you look at wikipedia and see that mobile phones were using almost the exact same iconography -- phone silhouette over light green background -- at least as far back as 1989:
Nokia Mobira Cityman
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia#First_mobile_phones
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nokia_150_and_nokia_1100.j...
The only difference is that the icon has been rotated and now has a shorter aspect ratio. Also the silhouette is now white instead of black.