{"id":5316,"date":"2026-07-16T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/?p=5316"},"modified":"2026-07-15T22:07:27","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T03:07:27","slug":"july-16-2026-patent-of-the-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/?p=5316","title":{"rendered":"July 16, 2026, Patent of the Day"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On July 16, 1996, U.S. Patent No. 5,536,196, issued to Harry W. Sternberg on a Drinking Vessel with Sound Effects — the mug generates a burping sound when it is put down.<\/p>\n\n\n

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The patent was assigned to Fun-Damental Too, Ltd., a novelty company whose schtick was novelties with sound effects. Trademark litigators may recognize another of Fun-Damental Too’s products: the toilet bank that makes a flushing noise:<\/p>\n\n\n

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Unfortunately, Fun-Damental Too was confronted with an infringing toilet bank with flushing noises, which resulted in Fun-Damental Too, Ltd. v. Gemmy Indus. Corp., 111 F.3d 993, 42 U.S.P.Q.2D 1348 (2nd Cir. 1997)(affirming a preliminary injunction in favor of Fun-Damental Too).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On July 16, 1996, U.S. Patent No. 5,536,196, issued to Harry W. Sternberg on a Drinking Vessel with Sound Effects — the mug generates a burping sound when it is put down. The patent was assigned to Fun-Damental Too, Ltd., … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-patent-of-the-day","category-uncategorized"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5316","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5316"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5316\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5324,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5316\/revisions\/5324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}