A recent decision by the Australian Trade Marks Office has dealt Apple a blow in its attempt to monopolize the letter “i” as part of the name of its products, says Larissa Wayne, an attorney with FB Rice & Co, writing on the firm’s website.

“Apple launched opposition proceedings against a small Sydney company which applied to register the trade mark DOPi, iPod in reverse, for laptop bags and cases adapted for use with Apple products,” Wayne reports. “The Sydney company submitted that DOPi stands for Digital Options and Personalised Items.”

The basis of Apple's objection was that the DOPi name was too similar to iPod for portable music players.

Wayne says that the hurdle which Apple failed to reach is that a “person of ordinary intelligence and memory” would automatically assume that a product name including the letter “i” is an Apple product.

“The Hearing Officer said that while it clearly cannot have escaped the applicant’s attention that DOPi also happened to be iPod in reverse, this 'coincidental' similarity is not enough to render the trademark ‘deceptively similar’ to the iPod mark,” Wayne wrote.

“While this decision potentially paves the way for more trademarks with the letter ‘i,’ it has not necessarily weakened any of Apple’s current ‘i’ trademarks,” Wayne said. “Apple is infamous for challenging any individual or company that it believes may be infringing its copyright and trademarks.”