©Cook'd and Bomb'd

[Johnny Yesno]

With there being so many good ideas on this site I was wondering what the copyright situation is here. Not that I want to nick anything, mind. Honest Guv! I just wouldn't want to see some chocolate manufacturer copyrighting "We made the Devil make you do it" (which, sadly I know, I still find hilarious even after all this time) for themselves.

[Concerned But Powerless]

I've been printing avatars and captions on to cheap t-shirts and selling them for almost two years now.

My Gary Bushell line is very popular.

[Garfield And Friends]

With there being so many good ideas on this site I was wondering what the copyright situation is here.

Dunno. But I've seen ideas swiped without credit from other sites before. Some Joel Veitch (B3TA-er) animated madness was all-but-thieved for an Irish Times newspaper TV advert.

[Still Not George]

That penguins-in-Venice advert is blatantly nicked from a whole slew of online flash thingies too.

[TJ]

Someone once pretty much copied the entire website, and then accused us of having 'stolen' from them in the first place. It was only around for about five minutes, and I now think it might have been someone we know taking the piss (no idea who, though).

[TraceyQ]

Um, the Switch advert? Joel Veitch from rathergood.com did that. He's also done a load of stuff for VH2.

[Still Not George]

Ah, I should have known. Insert embarrassed smiley here.

[Rats]

Has anyone mention notnowlewis yet?

[Uncle_Z]

There is no copyright in ideas, only in works of art.  Short posts, quips, slogans would probably fail to attract copyright protection due to some latin stuff about desserts.

De minimis non curat lex = the law does not deal in trifles

Poems, short stories (irrespective of artistic merit), and detailed articles a la Jutl are the copyright of the author and happily have been rendered in a tangible form by being stuck up here.

[Purple Tentacle]

Oh fucking christ!

All of jutl's posts have gone!

[smoker]

Oh fucking christ!

All of jutl's posts have gone!

pah, no great loss. he made most of it up anyway, and the rest he plagiarized

[Johnny Yesno]

slogans would probably fail to attract copyright protection

So if I wanted to market wanking I could steal "It's what your right arm's for" from Courage and they couldn't do a thing about it. Cool!
I guess it also means that if a chocolate manufacturer* used "We made the Devil make you do it" they couldn't stop CaB from using it, although it would be all soiled.



*I don't have any inside info on chocolate manufacturers BTW. It was just something that crossed my mind when those Magnum Seven Deadly Sins ice creams were being advertised on the telly.

[fanny splendid]

slogans would probably fail to attract copyright protection

So if I wanted to market wanking I could steal "It's what your right arm's for" from Courage and they couldn't do a thing about it. Cool!

Wouldn't that be trademarked or copyrighted, anyway? Or at least, if you brewed your own beer and tried to use it for that?

[Purple Tentacle]

Oh fucking christ!

All of jutl's posts have gone!

pah, no great loss. he made most of it up anyway, and the rest he plagiarized

He he, this backlash is great.

Let's knock that "Verbwhore of the Year" fucker down from his pedestal of knowledge, and piss on his face.

[Uncle_Z]

Heh.  Just in case it aint sarcasm, slogans etc. may benefit from protection as trademarks.  If not registered (I think Kit Kat tried to register "Have a break" but failed) then it has to have a high enough profile for the public to be confused.  (Something like that anyway.  I am really very poor indeed on trademark law).

I doubt wanking needs a lot of marketing though, and in any event the Courage slogan was clearly trying to steal wanking's thunder.  (I think the Renegade Soundwave song Pocket Porn uses the exact phrase and predates Courage's use).

[smoker]

wanking gets plenty of marketing, it seems like every single ad you see nowadays encourages one off the wrist. dangerous when you see one out the window of a bus

[JesusAndYourBush]

A few years ago I remember some bloke in Scotland called McDonald owned a cafe, and called it McDonald's, but some other cunts who'd had the same idea successfully sued him and prevented him from using HIS OWN NAME.  How the hell does that work?

[Still Not George]

A few years ago I remember some bloke in Scotland called McDonald owned a cafe, and called it McDonald's, but some other cunts who'd had the same idea successfully sued him and prevented him from using HIS OWN NAME.  How the hell does that work?

It's called having enough money to own every fucking lawyer in the world.

[Vermschneid Mehearties]

Heh.

"Me and the McDonalds people...We've got a bit of a..misunderstanding

Those who'll get it will get it and those who won't won't.

[weekender]

Wasn't imitationleather convinced that some bloke in the Guardian was stealing a load of thread ideas for his column?

[Dr David V]

Who was it who did the Only Pools And Corpses gag? That was nicked by the Sun, wasn't it?

[Sherringford Hovis]

There is no copyright in ideas, only in works of art.  

If only that were true...

America's biggest export over the last two years was Intellectual Property; and the only thing that's going to save every citizen of our planet from having to have their lawyer present with them 24/7 in case they infringe on someone's IP is the fact that loads of emergent economies like China and most of Asia see the way that patents and copyright are administered at present for the crock of shite they truly are...

Fuck. That was a long sentence. Pub. Night all.

[terminallyrelaxed]

Yeah and frankly I wouldn't put it past them as ridiculous as it sounds. I mean, I gave up reading her for torture years ago but you only have to look at Julie Burchill's subject matter to see that they're just casting around looking for anything to write about to which they can apply their broad generalisations and shock-seeking standpoints. I read the guardian me, its politics are the only ones I can stmach, but if its not the bleeding hearts who are given column inches pissing me off, its some flighty winsome ignorant fuckwit without an agenda save their own career lashing out at something or other to make themselves feel important and informed.
At first I found the weekend columns of wry commentry on the journalists private and family life  (the guy with fifteen kids and the bitchy wife, the guy who publishes his and his girlfriends arguments, the pussy-whipped metro-sexual clown with all the 'outrageous' rich posh mates who he gets to wryly feel superior to every week) rather charming and diverting, but now they just make me scream "oh yes but you're so fucking admirable aren't you, you chelsea dwelling trustafarian fair weather fuckwit?" but this freaks my girlfriend out on a saturday morning so now I just take out The Guide and the main braodsheet and bung the rest straight in the bin.....

[Vermschneid Mehearties]

The Life supplement on Thursdays is excellent though.

I tend to avoid reading any actual opinions in it, bar Simon Hoggart who's opinions are extremely closely linked to the news anyway.

[El Unicornio, mang]

A few years ago I remember some bloke in Scotland called McDonald owned a cafe, and called it McDonald's, but some other cunts who'd had the same idea successfully sued him and prevented him from using HIS OWN NAME.  How the hell does that work?

Because it's seen as making money from something similar. If he opened up a shop called McDonald's which sold ornaments, he'd be fine. (unless someone else had an ornament shop called McDonald's)
There is no copyright on words. I could make a film called Close Encounters of the Third Kind and there's fuck all Steven Spielberg could do about it.
Some idiot a few years ago tried to sue the makers of Scream because he said they were making a profit from his awful sci-fi flop Screamers. He was laughed out of court, obviously.

[Tokyo Sexwhale]

A few years ago I remember some bloke in Scotland called McDonald owned a cafe, and called it McDonald's, but some other cunts who'd had the same idea successfully sued him and prevented him from using HIS OWN NAME.  How the hell does that work?

Because it's seen as making money from something similar. If he opened up a shop called McDonald's which sold ornaments, he'd be fine. (unless someone else had an ornament shop called McDonald's)
There is no copyright on words. I could make a film called Close Encounters of the Third Kind and there's fuck all Steven Spielberg could do about it.
Some idiot a few years ago tried to sue the makers of Scream because he said they were making a profit from his awful sci-fi flop Screamers. He was laughed out of court, obviously.

I don't think that's strictly true.  Harrods once took legal action against a hairdresser who called her shop "Hair-rods".  I don't think Harrods has a salon (although I could be wrong).

[Uncle_Z]

If only that were true...

Agree with the sentiment, and indeed I should have quoted s1 CDPA in full with quotes and everything and been clear to put geographical limits on the analysis but I was kinda supposed to be working so my attention was drawn away ;)

Case law for assertion that a literary work does not have to have artistic merit to be protected involves dear old Edwina Currie.

[weekender]

He was laughed out of court, obviously.

Like king mob was when he went to see his lawyers about some flash thing that Rats did?

That whole incident makes me laugh, sorry.

[El Unicornio, mang]

I think that's different though as they are blatantly making fun of the Harrods name/parodying it, for their own gain.
I've seen plenty of shops with the same names as other well known stores and they're fine.

[Ambient Sheep]

I could make a film called Close Encounters of the Third Kind and there's fuck all Steven Spielberg could do about it.

I don't *think* you're right there.  Certainly in the UK there's what's known as "passing off" laws, where you can be sued if it looks like you're trying to pass off your film as another.  (So it's a good job you've now moved to Florida ;-) ) I mean if the subject matter was wildly different you might get away with it in the end, but I'd expect to see the inside of a courtroom first.  Just look at this that I read the other day, from iMDB's trivia entry for Austin Powers: Goldmember:

All promotional material (including online trailers) bearing the movie's original title, "Austin Powers in Goldmember", was withdrawn in late January 2002. MGM and Danjaq, who control the James Bond license, obtained a cease-and-desist order from the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) arbitration panel on the grounds that New Line was attempting to trade on the James Bond franchise without authorization. The matter went to arbitration and the film was known briefly as "The third installment of Austin Powers" until the matter was settled on 11 April 2002. MGM agreed that New Line could use the original Goldmember title on condition that it had approval of any future titles that parodied existing Bond titles. New Line also had to agree to show the trailer for the new MGM James Bond film, Die Another Day (2002) with Goldmember.