Toy Soldiers and the Right to Privacy (1 Viewer)

jazzeum

jazzeum

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This is a very right interesting article about Olivia de Havilland suit against FX Studios and how she was depicted in the movie “Feud.” If you read it from the toy soldier point of view — do manufacturers need the permission of their subjects when they make toy soldiers depicting them (an obligation that manufacturers do not comply with, in my opinion) — it becomes more interesting.

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/03/...k9JfrKZFLu33Quf&recp=2&mi_u=39918670&referer=

This site is also interesting: Rothman’s Roadmap to the Right Of Publicity, a useful guide for manufacturers in understanding their obligations.
 
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jazzeum said:
This is a very right interesting article about Olivia de Havilland suit against FX Studios and how she was depicted in the movie “Feud.” If you read it from the toy soldier point of view — do manufacturers need the permission of their subjects when they make toy soldiers depicting them (an obligation that manufacturers do not comply with, in my opinion) — it becomes more interesting.

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/03/...k9JfrKZFLu33Quf&recp=2&mi_u=39918670&referer=

This site is also interesting: Rothman’s Roadmap to the Right Of Publicity, a useful guide for manufacturers in understanding their obligation
Click to expand...
True enough Brad - The Glen Miller Band - produced by Frontline was a case in point. I believe the Family of Glen Miller objected to the unauthorised use of the band in a Toy Soldier set - and asked for the TS Company to stop producing it - and they did stop.

However, M'lud - there have also been cases of producers who produce things that look 'something like' a somebody, or a something - and don't face prosecution, presumably BECAUSE they haven't named the someone - or the Acted Character, they are loosely portraying (I believe that the legal term for it in the USA is "Transformative" i.e., the figure portrayed is not 'enough like' the person, or character, who might be tempted to complain or take legal action.)

I'm always slightly amazed, that in many threads on this Forum, quite a few people actually ASK TS producers to make characters from films, where well known actors play those roles. Are they unwittingly asking people to put themselves in legal jeopardy by asking them to possibly commit a civil or legal offence?

I guess we will only know - when somebody does take legal action against a TS Company.

jb
 
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Interesting post but I seriously doubt she will get anywhere with it.

Dave
 
I'm certain if the manufacturer offered a cut of the sale, their objections of being depicted in figure form would be greatly diminished.
 
johnnybach said:
I'm always slightly amazed, that in many threads on this Forum, quite a few people actually ASK TS producers to make characters from films, where well known actors play those roles. Are they unwittingly asking people to put themselves in legal jeopardy by asking them to possibly commit a civil or legal offence?[/B]



jb
Click to expand...


In terms of TS or war gaming miniatures, its basically a "C & D" situation, where actual civil actions are rare (not worth the cost, except for Disney and Viacom*, LOL, who will spend 7 figures to prove a point and maintain a track record)

Basically producing an exact likeness, and calling it "The Away team", the "Archaeologist" or such (for TOS Star Trek crew or Indiana Jones) is sufficient. UNLESS the figure is directly competing with a licensed figure.

One is not really conspiring by requesting a figure from a manufacturer. Now, I wouldnt go on record asking a manufacturer "Can you make --------- figure, violating any and all trademark, copyright and IT laws?" ;)


* My "The Sword and the Spongebob: Dork's Drift" game I ran at conventions (28mm war game, basically Spongebob and crew defending the Crusty Crab from hordes of "Zuluplankton) for the chir'ren was such a hit, I wanted to produce and market figures and rules (totally non profit, as a way tpo get kids into war gaming). Viacom pooped on my party, so to speak. :D
 
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Frankly, I have no idea what you wrote or what point, if any, you were trying to make. Stream of consciousness rarely works.

As an aside, please try to be careful in the future with editing a quoted post.
 
jazzeum said:
Frankly, I have no idea what you wrote or what point, if any, you were trying to make. Stream of consciousness rarely works.

As an aside, please try to be careful in the future with editing a quoted post.
Click to expand...


My bad, I was watching basketball, painting terrain, posting with my right hand while emailing on a pad with my left, and it did turn out to be stream of consciousness. Sorry about editing your quote, I intended to highlight that sentence in bold, as it was what I was replying to, and I somehow deleted the rest.

I forgot what point I was trying to make, except maybe Viacam are heartless scrooges who hate the chir'ren? :)
 
What I find amusing is the artists who produce figures based on things like movies, without giving a thought to whether the subject is copyrighted, but they turn around and scream bloody murder when Red Chinese or Russian pirates copy their works (and sell them at ridiculously low prices). I see a lot of that on PlanetFigure, whose membership includes a lot of commercial sculptors.

Prost!
Brad
 
On a related subject, I have it on good authority that the designs of most vehicles, including tanks, are still owned by the various companies that produced them. It is my understanding that companies based in Western countries must obtain licensing from these original companies before producing models of tanks/vehicles.

There are two important exceptions to this:
  • Many companies headquartered in countries that flaunt intellectual property laws get away with making unlicensed models.
  • The comapnis that have the rights to WWII German vehicles do not pursue those who steal their designs, likely because they do not wish to remind people that they produced military equiptment for the Nazis.


I may be entirely wrong about this, but it seemed credible when I heard it.
 
I would be curious on what theory. Copyright? Copyright doesn’t last forever and eventually come into the public domain.
 
Patents expire 20 years after date of approval by the Patent Office. This period applies to the the US and Europe.
 
Probably licensing to use the brand name. I know in the farm toy world that is the case.
 
It’s probably copyright but copyright protection doesn’t last forever. If we’re speaking of brand names, then it can be trademark but if you’re not using the mark in the field of use, it’s susceptible to challenge.
 
I recall stories in the news a couple of years ago, that some manufacturers were going to try to trademark the military designations for their products, specifically in the case of aircraft. Boeing wanted to trademark "B-17" and "Flying Fortress", for example, and Lockheed Martin etc, etc, wanted to trademark "B-24" and "Liberator". Their goal was to tap into the money flowing around in hobbies like scale modeling, and in collectibles. Here are two articles from 2008 about Lockheed Martin's attempt; apparently they were beaten back:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/04/liberate-b-24-liberator

https://boingboing.net/2008/05/22/eff-forces-lockheed.html

I haven't done more research to track down other examples.

Prost!
Brad
 
Interesting articles, Brad, thanks for posting. The Fair Use doctrine is an American creation but it's expanding to parts of the rest of the world. I seem to recall that Australia has adopted it.
 
On a side note, Ken was very proud that he was the only TS manufacturer being granted a license from Jeep for a WWII model. I am unclear what the IP is. Certainly trademark but I think ken referenced blueprints
 
What about members pictures of diarama/setups ?
Didn't FL use Franks on it's site,personally I would find it a compliment and accept a free tank or two lol.
 
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