First used the phrase in 2007? Has El Reg been shirking off school for a cheeky fag behind the bikesheds rather attended IT Buzzphrase classes with the malodorous Mr Jenkins?

Minus 10 house points. And stop chucking spit balls at Miss Bee - you'll only give her issues in later life.

"Dell has very quietly pushed its trademarking application past the phase where opponents of its move can have any say in the process."

In other words they followed the same process as everyone else and published the mark in the Official Gazette of the Patent and Trademark Office.

As opposed to all these other companies which send press releases to every website they can when they're trying to register a new trademark in order to maximize the likelihood of someone objecting.

Maybe if "Cloud computing" is trademarked it'll just disappear.

>a catch-all term used widely among CEOs

i.e. Total meaningless bollocks.

just how fucked-up the 'patent' system really is, if any company/organisation/individual could be granted a patent for a two-word phrase.

Must file a patent application;

"Cloud Computing" - A combination of measurement instrumentation and specifically created software to enable the calculation of the dispersal cloud from a release of toxic or flammable gasses / bullshit.

you are confusing patents with trademarks. They are patenting the "invention" of "cloud computing", not the name "cloud computing"

Could have enough laughter to contain this latest gaffe guys. There is no active engineering there anymore, the major founders all left some years ago. a few BIOS-heads remain, but so far into the Ether(net) that reality there's no way anyone but Marketriods could have this idea.

Fools above who comment on what they don't understand...

Dell's application is for a Trademark - i.e. the words "cloud computing" to be used to identify a brand, much like the way that "Dell" and "The Register" are registered and used as such.

Dell are NOT trying to patent cloud computing - at least not with the information located in this news story.

Also, I'm sure El Reg has noticed that the Trademark registration was filed five days BEFORE cloud computing was used in the referenced Reg story...

are you saying we could all patient buzz words to stop management types using them?!

i'm all for that!!

copyright away mr. dell!

I wonder if I can trademark the phrase "patent application".... wouldn't that be sweet!

Faeces/Excrement.

Same shit, different name.

Please adjust your sarcasm/irony detectors accordingly.

Must remember to use this icon more often, just to make it more *obvious* for some people out there!

Dammit - and I hoped for a moment that this dreadful term would become restricted to Dell and meteorologists.

Right if Dell can do it then Ive bagsied the phrase 'going forward'. I think £5 per utterance of this annoying term (from anyone) will keep me in the lifestyle I deserve.

If you are in Rio come and say hi. I will be the one on the beach with more women than I can handle and a very large sack of Columbian marching powder.

Paris, cos she will be lying next to me :-)

"you are confusing patents with trademarks. They are patenting the "invention" of "cloud computing", not the name "cloud computing""

I think you're the muppet here. Clearly the article talks about applying for trademark protection, and the associated link takes you to the application as processed by the USPTO, which happens to handle both Patent and Trademarks!

They are going to patent "Lightning Support" as well..........hail no, probably not.

NCR tried to strong-arm everyone to put TM after every mention of 'tower' because they'd trademarked it. Guess who ended up looking stupid?

Hey! You! Get off of my patent?/trademark...

"Hey! You! Get off of m'IP " sounds a bit snappier (and resolves the other issue).

Paris, 'cause she prefers know-how

Trademarks can be withdrawn if they come into generic use (ergo you don't need to put a (TM) after asprin). I'd say cloud computing is already well past that stage. If Dell plan to preserve their trademark I wouldn't expect it to last past the first challenge.

The exception is if they're using it in a field where is *isn't* a generic term - eg. if they tied it to storage solutions.

I think the phrase we need is "locking the barn door after the horse has bolted."

Hooo shit! I think I'll go for "proactive".

I mean, what the FUCK does that mean? You're for activity? You aren't amateur any more? What?

I hope Dell prevails on their trademark ... maybe people will move on to yet another amorphous buzzword so they can continue to spew and not say anything substantive.