Trademarked/copyright question?

Sorry to bug you nice folks,

I'm a tad confused bout trademarked/copywriten stuff.

Saw a thread bout some Digimon viewer thing and someone brought it to the post persons attention bout it being a trademarked item and that they probably shouldn't be selling it or giving it away.

But on the otherhand I've seen Trigun stuff everywhere and I've even bought the Optimus Prime avitar.

Now
I'm not sure if I can make and sell stuff like Transformers in game. Are we gonna get slammed or is this like the same as the stores that sell Transformer T-shirts and the like that I know are not sanctioned by Hasboro or Marvel?

Please help 'fore I get my ass in deep poopie, I've seen numerous "trademark infringements" running around, and I don't want to contribute to possible illeagal practices that may get me sued and/or SL shut down. Just wanna make cool stuff and have a good time.

Linden feedback would be most welcome.

I'm sure a Linden will clear this up. In the meantime, here's my take. Yes, techically we're not supposed to be copying (or selling) stuff with tradmarks or copyrights, but the chance of getting busted (at least currently) is probably low, since nobody is earning fame and fortune with them. Even if someone got "caught", I suspect they (or the Lindens) would probably get a persnickety letter from a lawyer demanding to remove the offending item or get sued.
Then again, I'm not an expert, so perhaps someone will set me straight.

Ummm.. That person with the digimon stuff is me.. Anyways, although it is illegal , i hardly doubt a huge company would take the time to sue someone making a digital item that they make around 100 lindens off of. They'll lose more money hiring lawyers anyways. I wouldn't worry about it if I were you. Even popular places such as --------------------- sell 747 Boeings. I don't think Boeing is happy about that, but it's still at that store. But this is an interesting thread, i'm still confused how it would affect the trademark thing, because lindens are merely items as well. And if Second Life isn't affiliated with any of the exchange markets, then we should have no problem here. I'm probably wrong so someone correct me.

Thanks Olympia,

Or is it that we can make these items and like just change the name or apperence slightly or something to that effect?

You can, but as I said in my post above, chances are extremely low (better chance of being hit by a lightning bolt), of you getting a cease and desist from a company. Unless oyu start making hundreds of converted dollars from lindens, nothing will happen. But whether you want to take that chance or not is up to you.

Good lookin Atmos and your Digiviewer thing looks great!!!

Yeah I see what your say plus I would guess that since we're making inworld items vs tangible items I personally don't see the possible harm. Just used your stuff as an example bud.

Me I'm 100% into it, I even added Optimus Prime's "Autobots, transform and rool out!!" to a gesture

I was more or less defending you cause I'm not clear as to how someone can give you grief (no attack, was very kindly brought up in you thread) when I've seen the Trigun stuff everywhere, which kicks major anime ass I might add

BTW anyone into Evangelion? My favorite!!! me thinks me sees Unit 01 comin to SL reeeeeal soon

Hmm... do you think my avatars (aka Teletubbies, sylvester, Bugs Bunny) is something i culd get sued for? If so im shutting down my avatar shop

I can say this much as far as anime (and only anime) is concearned: when it comes to fan-created works in RL (cosplay costumes, fanart, music videos), the American licencors have a tendacy to look the other way if not privately encourage them, especialy since for them, it ammounts to free publicity. Many people sell costumes, fan-art and homemade plush dolls, etc, on sites like E-bay (though selling discs of anime music videos, or AMVs, is highly frowned upon by the community who makes them because they also have the RIAA to worry about). And the Japanese fans have the widely accepted practice of making and selling doujinshi, or fan-created manga. So I think the presence of anime-inspired items, clothing, AVies, etc, is something like that, unless any of the anime companies somehow found SL and decided to release "officialy licenced" content to the world.

I should probably say that the mater gets more and more fuzzy if you were to start making a whole lot of $US off of the sales of anime goods in SL. It's hard to say what it would take for a company to step in and say "all right, that's too much."

And again: this is a special case.

No, trust me, even if you happen to get caught by one of the executives, they will send you a cease and desist letter. What that is, is that it tell you to stop selling your products or they WILL eventually sue (years later ). You have nothing to worry about. Besides Teletubbies is in the UK and Bugs Bunny has been copied billions of times anyways in the real world.



This is totally true, but anime thats already popular in the states usually don't go easy on people who produce copyrighted items ( Nintendo and Dragon Ball Z are big killers of that), but I couldn't have said it any better myself.

For every one that thinks they have nothing to worry about reproducing copyright material and distributing it. And thinks that a cease and desist letter is all you will get. Should probably go talk to the thousands of people sued by the music industry for do the exact same thing.

I find it amazing with all the oh my god someone stole my idea/object threads. That any one would think it is okay to do the same with a product that existed in real life first. There is no difference. And that some how that the slim chance of being caught makes it okay. I for one don't buy from people who have copyright material for sale that they don't own the rights to.
And i am thinking of starting to neg rate them. Its against the law plain and simple and if you do it your breaking the law there is no argument or excuse.

unless you are located in thailand

There are execptions, of course, DBZ back in the day (Funimation, although they seem to be trying to become more of a fan-friendly company now), anything Nintendo, and I'm less sure about 4Kids (Pokemon) and the other "pocket monster" shows.

The rest...I'll put it this way, this sort of fanart dealings go on at every anime convention in the country, and the representivies from american and sometimes Japanese companies are frequently the guests. If they wanted to complain about it (although they will crack down on actual piracy, people passing off merchendise as the real thing), they've had many chances.

Of course it is a violation. Most likely nothing will come of it.

Yet. People are quick to holler about DMCA when *their* prims get copied. Isn't it fair play to extend the same rights to everyone else, even if they are a mega corporation? After all, rights are rights, yes?

I guess what I am saying is there cannot be a double standard. Either it is or it isn't OK to copy stuff we didn't create. We should use ourselves as the yardstick for determining whether or not it is OK to copy stuff. Just ask yourself if you would mind other people re-creating your stuff without permission. If the answer is yes, you would mind ... then the choice is obvious. Refrain from copying anyone elses stuff. Even if the other "person" is a billion dollar corporation who prolly wouldnt do anything about it. Otherwise the spirit of creative ownership is tainted.

We cant have it both ways.

-AP

What's this suppose to mean? The UK doesn't have lawyers? Rights? Copyrights/trademarks? Wow, such ignorance...

No, copyrighted material from other countries don't apply in america..

P.S. More than 50% of all the items in SL are from copyrighted material (I log into SL and I see someone wearing and ECKO shirt), good luck trying to stop that.

Not all laws are moral.

Here's the deal...

Using copyrighted and/or trademarked items (objects, textures, sounds, etc.) is illegal; plain and simple. The holder of the copyright or trademark has a legal right to sue.

With that said, I view the current situation in SL as analogous to the early days of Napster. In that case there was tons of copyrighted material being tossed around, and not much was being done about it.

From Linden Labs point of view, they MUST be concerned about this, and will take action if/when something is pointed out, or is blatant. I remember them ripping down a McDonalds parody build about 6 months ago.

The reason they have to be concerned is because, as the host for this content, they run quite a legal risk if they are seen as facillitating copyright or trademark infringement. Look at what happened to Napster after the record companies sued them. They basically no longer exist.

But with all that said, I'll be the first to admit that I have used some copyrighted content. In my case, its mostly textures that come from images I've taken from the web. If I see a .jpg or .gif on the web that I think would look kewl for something I'm doing in SL, I'll just grab it, and then import it into SL as a texture.

At the end of the day, the situation is this. The legal line is VERY clear. Either something is copyrighted or trademarked or it is not, and if it is and you are not the holder, then you shouldn't be using it.

But the enforcement line is fuzzy...

If you want to cross that fuzzy line, don't be surprised if you're ever faced with a cease and desist, or if your content gets ripped down by the Lindens. And if you are profiteering using copyrighted or trademarked content, then it is quite possible that you could some day find yourself in court, paying damages.

- Ace

First I would really like to thank all of you for replying. I definately see where the TM/CR infringment can come into the equation.

As pointed out "if you don't own it, don't use it".

Now, is there a difference between us making a "digital reproduction" of a TM/CO in game. Not trying to be dense I guess the question/point I'm looking for is, is there a difference since we are creating non tangible reproductions that can only be used in the SL game.

Example: If u create a transformer inn SL it can only be used in SL and can not interfere with Hasbor/Marvel marketing and profit simply because I can't take said Xformer and "play with it, sell it in direct competition" with what Hasboro/Marvel are selling and making a living from. It is impossible to have competition with a real world company so you can in no way impact thier business profits.

That being said, also realizing that you can not negatively represent this product obviously, but by repro'ing in game may lead to more business for said company ie: free advertising, make Trigun, sell it in world, and if someone wanted an actual product they would have to go else where to aquire the tangible product.

Now if we stick to the straight forward definition then that would render half the products in SL illegal: Phat Farm, Levi's Jeans, even logo t-shirts, even BDSM products, numerous others I've yet to see and countless "little" things that already exist.

I see we're your going with the Napster analogy but not sure it's the same. Free music took away profit from the artist. SL content can't replace real world item therefore, I would think, could not possible take away thier profitability in the real world.

I hope I'm making sense and please feel free to expond upon this issue further,
Sincerly thanks to all, and is it possible to get some Linden input here?

Actually, Johnny, there are limitations as to what is copyrighted and whats a derivitive work. Mostly for SL this applys to "Art" I.E. Textures and design concepts which for the most part make up SL.

However, to give you an example about a year ago I had made a M&M tshirt when this very same subject was being broached heavly because of the creation of Pahoa and My online Webstore that sells Trademark Licensed Apparel to the real world populace. I had to remove the T-shirt as it did violate both Trademark and Copyright License law.

We had made a garden that had been assembled from inworld Landscape sellers trees. Most of the trees were Linden creations of course however 1 that showed up in the calender picture was not. The Issue that it belonged to someone else was brought up on the forums as a point of complaint and it went from there. We removed the picture to prevent any further issues until I could do more research. After countless hours on the phone with Lawyers and reading multitudes of brochures and proceedures of copyright law and invoking copyright enforcement there is a lot of grey area that people are unaware of.

#1 if its not filed with the copyright office with in 30days of creation and multiple copies of the orginal both digitaly and via print are not supplied the Person can sue but they will not recieve full benifits for the claim as it wasnt filed.

#2 if its not filed with the copyright office where a legal search can readly obtain the information 9 times out of 10 it has to be a seriously Strong Case for a Lawyer to even consider it. As in most cases its very expensive to sue and if the case is lost most of the time the cost for legal fees is a detriment to the Sue'er than to the sued.

#3 If it is on file the penalties are stiff US$25,000 per infringement. Thus if you sell 100 copies of something then that would be US$2.5 million. Not a pretty picture when you think about it.

Thus, I have attempted to not use copyright protected material in my creations.(if it is I am unaware as 98% of my textures I create from scratch now and I hold the orginal .psp files that created them.

All these exotic clothes you see in world where people have scarfed the image off of an image on the web can be sued as 9 time out of 10 those clothing articles and trademark clothing lines are on file with the copyright office.
Thus if that particular image of clothing can be construed as a derivative work base soely on the texture then those individuals can be sued without remorse. Why because 9 times out of 10 half of them that do it dont even remember where they scarfed the texture from.

Fortunately I have been creating my own works lately and developing my own style that does not force me to need or even think about scarfing the web for images anymore.

Textures are something that can be replicated again and again and again and through filter programs and manipulation can be redone to the point of being orginal works by that creator.

But the moment someone cries you stole my texture and if it was scarfed off the web then no one has a case as the burden of proof is on the claimer and the person that has been accused is innocent until proof otherwise has been shown. So if the Texture was scarfed off the web at one of these free texture sites then no one can lay claim to anything as the trail to the orginal creator is ambigious at best.

Ok I have ranted enough I hope that gives some further insight to copyright law and its intracacies but I assure you its not as simple as black and white there is a whole range of grey in between.

Take care

Sincerely, Shadow Weaver

As far as hiring lawyers go... They already have lawyers just waiting to be put to use. I know we do and we have 5 people in the company. When someone tries to publish or illegally rent something of ours we send them a nice little email telling them to stoppit.

Since there is real life money being made from objects tin these games they may also ask for all of the money that was made from said objects and have full rights to it.

No, they wont be hiring lawyers they already have them, but you might if they feel like it.

Wiggles who has lawyers? Just curios as Iwasnt understanding the connotation we that you used was that reference a Real life organization?

Oh and Yeah I do have Real Life Lawyers 3 in fact...hehe...all in the family.

I was referring to most companies that are having their logos and designs sold for money in SL.

Someone said these companies probably wouldnt go through the cost of hiring lawyers, and I was pointing out that they most likely have lawyers on the payroll.

In that case Wiggles I agree that is true if its a "Corporation" however my reference point was to individual creators that are like me that amiably do things but dont have US$20 a picture to register it with the Copyright office let alone hire a lawyer to sue the hell out of someone.