SLX account deleted after merger

Trust me I have no problem with pulling the item.. I modified it as I was told to.. If the modification wasn't good enough they should have just pulled the item again, Then no big deal I could care less. Not l like I was planning on making a killing off of it.. But to close my account after years of perfect business? That's totally insane..


The Steelers logo is actully stolen from the Steelers themseleves.. It was stolen from the ASIS which the only difference is the word Steelers.. The US Steel logo is still the same as it was when my father first started working for them. Heck most likely when my Grandfather did. The "STEEL" logo is used all over Pittsburgh by many business's and individuals. The 3 triangles represent the ingredients of steel.

What reason would the NFL have to keep tabs on me? I've never had run in's with them.. I can only think it was another merchant.. Sad thought there. I mind my own business and wish all other merchants well... <Shrugs> some people are just sad.

SLX has always been super sensitive to the point of retardation on trademarks.

To the point of killing resales of legit items because they were labeled properly. (to the point of demanding written permission to relist it on the site. Even though the item in question was legit... much like demanding you get Jeep's permission to list your Jeep in the paper as a Jeep Cherokee)

One reason I killed my account with them long ago.

You changed the texture and that constitutes "totally redone"? It's still a piece of paraphenalia, right? The same item as before, for the Pittsburgh Steelers?

Why would you need to make a totally new item for that? Remove the old item from your magic box under that name, and put the new one back in, under that name.

I think that is what they were trying to tell you in the emails that you apparently missed.



They have always done that. If they pull an item for an infraction, you CAN NOT relist it as new. You have to follow their instructions for modifying the restored listing, IF they elect to do so. In this case, they did, but you broke the "never relist" rule, which has been grounds for account closure for a long time.



Yep, I am aware, however, the context you are using it in makes it obvious what you are using it for, and thus, it will likely continue to get you in trouble going forward. Trademarks are assigned specific domains in which they apply, and when you are using the mark in a confusingly similar fashion, you'll likely get ganked for it. Especially by pro sports corporations; they LOVE to squash "fan merchandise"; i.e., knockoffs.

Not necessarily true. When I was new there, I mistakenly put up some NFL & MLB logo tattoos I had. They do regular sweeps for those violations & most likely you werent the only one that day to be contacted. When I asked about similar items i searched for and found, they immediately took those down, too.

However, NBA items are allowed; "Xstreet SL was contacted previously by the NBA and all NBA items are
permitted to be sold through the Xstreet SL Marketplace."

Trademark control
I just had an item returned from Xstreet because it broke trademark regs.this was just a small mickey mouse priced item.Are the powers that be cracking down on this sort of stuff...Sl will be a lot lighter in content if they do.

I made a couple of changes and it is back out for sale again ,comments on if you think this is allowed please.




oops!!! I should not have said Mickey mouse LOL

This is my post from last week.Same deal, however I did not relist just altered the thing.Just as well else I would have got the same treatment.

?dips his head back down behind the parapet........

Disney are very very very very pro-active when it comes to protecting there trademark.
and tm stuff should by all rights be returned, its not your logo/trademark to sell.

The sports leagues and teams, even on the college level, are as bad as Disney about trademarks. Don't "F" with Disney and don't "F" with the sports teams, both will get you in hot water fast.

both pale in comparison to how scientology protects their rights...

put the logo for scientologykills.com website on a prim and hang it up... then you can hold an event to take bets how long that prim will stay up before autoreturned.

NEW GAME!!!

rofl

If they said to consult them first before trying to re-upload which seems to be the case from what you said then I have little sympathy for you but the small piece of advise to always watch the small print in customer service emails.

On the general topic of Slexchange or whatever the hell they want to call themselves at this point. For anyone who has even a basic understanding of the DMCA (and admittedly I'm no lawyer) they can't start moderating content or they lose any safe harbor privilege and instead of the taken notice/counter notice system they get an immediate lawsuit to tell us this person's name and oh yeah we're suing you as well as the merchant since you facilitated the theft.

Slexchange has of course gone way too far in a couple of cases most notably Sexbeds when they pretty much entirely decimated any right to right of first sale, the right you have to resell anything that you bought legally, even on copy items where there was no contract stating that you couldn't resell used items and they had a category for reselling used items which seems quite hypocritical.

Hopefully LL stepping in will make SLX comply with the DMCA both on the response time being ridiculously slow to notifications and the abusive usage of DMCA notifications side.

I suppose LL will know not only every item you buy but also every item you look at.

When fun events become huge mega-million dollar marketing machines, and they start going after fans of the sport, it's time to abandon them for their greed. Just do like I do, boycott all professional sports as they are more concerned with money than having a good time or the even the "art" of the sport. There is so much more to do in Real Life and Second Life than follow some corporate machine.

And are you using the same team colors as the real NFL memorabilia? Are the people using the US Steel logo deliberately choosing the team's colors for their works? There are many dynamics involved here, if it can be successfully demonstrated that your intent is infringing, you're going to lose unless you can afford to hire a better team of lawyers than their team of lawyers (and if it does go to court you can bet somebody's going to notify the NFL and get their lawyers involved too).

Is it worth the expense?

You did the crime you pay the price! NFL logos not trademarked? You must be joking!

I'll bet there will be alot more DCMA, trademark, etc stuff going on now that LL has access to XStreet listings. Kinda makes sense, have them police themselves in the name of LL rather than having to hire a few flunkies to keep up with a third party site and then have no control over whether the stuff actually gets removed or not.

I thought that Linden Lab's purchase of XStreetSL was a bad thing.

However, if they actually start removing illegal material that violates others' trademarks or copyrights, I will change my mind and applaud Linden Lab.

Maybe there is some legal argument somewhere that the NFL or the Steelers do not have a legally enforceable trademark on the Steelers logo. (The Redskins faced a legal challenge over trademark protection for that teams logo, under a federal law that prohibits trademark pretection for a mark that disparages race. Last I heard, the Redskins won that lawsuit, though it may be on another appeal or something.)

Now the NFL claims it owns the trademark to the Steelers logo. The NFL has a lot of lawyers. I have no doubt that they can summon some nightmarish litigation to protect the Steelers logo.

If you think you have the legal argument that defeats the trademark of the Steelers logo, I'm sure Linden Lab would prefer that you litigate the issue on your dime, rather than theirs.

And maybe the initial notice you got on the removal was not clear, but ultimately, it's really your primary responsibility to make sure you have your legal ducks in a row before you upload the item anyway.

Edit: And I have to add this sad observation, though. Linden Lab appears fully willing to protect the intellectual property of companies that have no association with Second Life. When it comes to protecting the intellectual property of the residents of Second Life, Linden Lab can't bother to put forth the effort. "If you have the money to sue us, we will lick your boots. If you don't have the money to sue us, screw you."

I'm sure it is, at least two usages are registered.

http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?regser=serial&entry=73340633
http://tarr.uspto.gov/servlet/tarr?regser=serial&entry=76025111

For me, it came down to a really simple question:

Why are you selling superbowl/NFL team paraphernalia without a license? No matter how you slice it, that smacks of so many levels of "wrong", that I don't think that the "cover" issue with SLX could invalidate them.

The "but I changed it to comply" response doesn't change the fact that you're trying to cash in selling "knockoff" merchandise without a license.

Yeah, I know, "everybody does it". However, that still doesn't make it ethical, let alone legal.

EXACTLY. That's the problem with SLX. They don't remove stuff reported by the owner of the trademark or copyright. They allow the competitors to report them so they have no competition. This has been going on at SLX for a long time and it nees to stop.

LL policy on in-world trademarks works the same way. They want to see the registration, but they don't require that the complaint comes from the owner. It's a very different world from the copyright stuff.

If you actually are violating a trademark of a big company- let's say the ever-litigious Disney, for example- your competitor is doing you a favor by reporting your violation to XStreetSL, rather than reporting it to Disney.

QFT. MLB is always going after fansites and even Little League teams for logo infringement.

'From sports cars to pirate ships 7000+ ways to get around'

Gotta get rid of those pirates yaarrrr!!

Though I must say the thread is disheartening, support at Xstreet already going down the pan...Ewww.

The specific case of the Pittsburgh Steelers is an interesting one in terms of the trademark of the logo, because it is based on the Steelmark ( see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steelmark ), a logo used by the American Iron and Steel Institute to promote steel. Unlike the other NFL logos, the Steelers logo is used under license from the AISI rather than being owned by the team.

It IS still a trademarked logo, however, and the trademark holders have the right to use the DMCA to request the takedown of items that use it. Demerits to the XStreetSL people for not making their objection to your item sufficiently clear, and I think the punishment of canceling your account is excessive, but delisting the item was proper.