Sanity as a service: marketing gone mad

There's been much ado over Dell's (thus far unsuccessful) attempt to grab a large slice of the cloud computing landscape ('clown computing' is still available, thanks Dave), but it seems this is just the tip of the iceberg. Here's some other gems:

• Web 3.0™ was registered to flowchart.com a month or two ago (maybe now someone can tell us what Web 3.0 really is?) but move.com wants it too.
  
• Technology-as-a-service™ has been working its way through the system since 2006 (but that didn't stop someone else applying for Technology as a service™ in other classes in June; they want TaaS too which is too bad for the Testing as a service™ crowd).
• Virtual Software as a service (VSaaS)™ is the next big thing according to ex-Microsoft Duane Ansel who's chasing a patent on 'on-demand cloning of virtual machines'.
• Arcadian Networks has already given up on Network[ing] as a Service™ (but that won't stop Eskel Porter).
  
• Google's Grand Central had a crack at Interoperability as a Service™.
• Virtualization as a Service™ will be bought to you (only) by Office Anywhere if they get their way.
• Intelligence as a Service™ is in demand according to Decision Intelligence.
• Softricity were going to be Powering Software as a Service™ and both Steve DePasquale and USinternetworking had planned to hold a monopoly on Delivering Software as a Service™.
• Catbird Networks had hoped to service the world's Security as a Service™ needs.
• ScreenDreamer(?) actually managed to get ScreenDreamer Success as a Service™ (but only the design)
• Visibility as a Service™ is the 'computerized monitoring of animate and inanimate objects labeled with RFID tags and providing of information concerning the location and/or condition of said monitored objects to third parties for commercial tracking purposes', but Big Brother™ has been registered no less than 10 times already and Surveillance as a Service™ is in the system too so I guess they had no choice.
• There can only be one Identity as a Service™ provider according to Fischer International.
• Recurrent Energy will be taking over Solar as a Service™ from the sun apparently.
• Don't even think about getting your Publishing as a Service™ done anywhere but OneSpot (formerly LargeSmall)
• Enterprise as a Service™ will be James Karch's domain (he's 'Someone at Jadaka', if that helps).
• Saama Technologies already managed to register Information as a Service™
• Spinact are 'coming soon' with Knowledge as a Service™
• Stratix are doing Mobility as a Service™
• Don't tell your ISP but LogMeIn will be handling Connectivity as a Service™ from now on.
• VisionAIR have already been granted a monopoly on Records as a Service™
• Apprenda were hoping for, wait for it, Software as a Service... as a Service™
• Xerox is taking care of Xerox Knowledge as a Service™ (despite already having a trademark for Xerox itself!?!?!)
• DaaS is a hive of activity too - AServer will tell you it stands for Datacenter as a Service™ but Q-Layer already tried that. Too bad for Desktone who are on the road to registering Desktops as a Service™
• Entrust's Business Signatures don't want us to forget that they're the Brains Behind Utility Computing™.
• Enki have got utility computing back to front with Computing Utility™
  
• And then there's one of my personal favourites, Monitoring as a Service™? Let's not forget about Alert Logic, Bulletproof, CITTIO, CommVault, Groundwork, Jumpnode, Kaseya, Monitis, Packet Island, RedHat, TruePath, my very own TrustSaaS and no doubt a bunch of others (I only got to the 3rd page of Google results).

Here's seven other IT terms that shouldn't be trademarked, and if you want to see if your favourite buzzword is under fire you can do so yourself with USPTO's Trademark Electronic Search System (TESS)

USPTO may well have some broken and flawed processes, but sanity often prevails. For those of you sitting on embarassing applications that need to be taken out the back and shot before they come back to haunt you, here's your loaded gun...