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azreal13 wrote:Now, if anyone wanted to take me to court, I'd have to point out that more people have asked me if it was some sort of historic German military symbol than have ever asked if it was anything GW related!

It's definitely not one of GW's original designs (very little of is). Just do a image search for 'heraldry eagle' and the symbol would fit right in.

 prowla wrote:
There's another side to this, thinking from GW's point of view. They're knee deep in the legal mire at the moment. As they started stalking the small companies for peanuts, now they sort of need to keep on going and keep staking their ground, all the way. So they are shipping the "GW legal team is watching you!" notifications by the bulk, to anything that might touch their IP - as a sort of pre-cease&desist, just in case something, someday needs actual attention. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if they'd target the tattoo parlors next, lol

Bear in mind, they said due to earlier warnings to the OP. It's possible they received those warnings quite a while ago, unrelated to the chapterhouse fiasco, and just decided, for them, it wasn't worth fighting. They're a big enough company that losing a few custom dice orders means little.

Noir wrote:
So after 10+ years GW now decide to stop Cheesex doning dice with "there" icons. Seem really late and donkey-cave thing to do. Yes atleast ten years as I still have a set from back then. GW only has a right to dice with that design if they can prove the made them first, I count find thous dice. GW lucky Cheesex is a bigish company so likey count get Pro-Bono.

GW new legal plan target company to big for Pro-Bono, but not big enouth to fight in court with there own money.

Not really. GW's trademarks refer to miniature gaming, and these dice are used for miniature gaming.

Cheesex are in the same position as thousands of companies, for instance photo printing shops who won't print works that they know aren't the customer's copyright.

Who cares. All Chessex rounded corner dice roll horribly anyway. Didnt you guys read the study?

Ravenous D wrote:...

If anything all this thread proves is GW really thinks that they own Greek letters, alchemy symbols and religious symbols that are old as time and not only getting away with it, but have convinced people that it is okay do so.

Really?

The only thing this thread proves is that appearantly you don't like it when a company says no to you and you'll believe anything about GW you read on the Internet.

It is very common for any 'print your own X' shops to get you to sign a disclaimer saying that it is your own copyright on the work. Chessex might be just doing due diligence here because a huge percentage of their business derives from GW players and they know that GW is litigious. But they could have the same issue if you tried to print out Mickey Mouse dice and Disney got word of it.
If they were making money off printing a GW design that you gave them, GW would have a legitimate copyright claim (assuming they own the copyright). If you tell them with a straight face that it is your own design (or sign a document saying that it is) the blame transfers to you.

Some of GW's claimed copyrights might be bogus, but others are legitimate and you need to be careful if you choose to do anything with those.

Chessex also used to supply dice TO GW.
They might still be the makers for their dice and unwilling to jeopardise that contract.

Why would anyone want dice imprinted with something as generic as an Alaitoc rune or a space marine emblem anyway? If you want custom dice, get something that's actually unique and personal.

 Ouze wrote:

weeble1000 wrote:
No, it isn't a "legal out." The liability, were there any, would rest on the shoulders of the individual actually infringing the copyright holder's exclusive rights. e.g. making and distributing copies of the work, selling copies of the work, etc. That would be Chessex.

Chessex has to make a decision about risk. Could one make a "generic" version of the symbol? I think so. Is that symbol a GW trademark? Probably very, very unlikely. So it would come down to copyright. A sword is a generic symbol in the public domain. The combination of a sword and a moon is also probably in the public domain. So there's plenty of room to create differentiation.

But different or no, that has no bearing on whether you wind up getting sued. Is it worth that to do a single custom order?

While I agree with what you said in it's totality; I have to ask: is Chessex expected to be aware of every single copyrighted symbol, icon, and design in the world? Is there no safe harbor provision here?

No, not at all. Independent creation is absolutely a defense to copyright infringement. One must have access to the work in question in order to copy it, after all. That said, when a work is out there, all a plaintiff must do is demonstrate a prima facie case of substantial similarity and access can be inferred from the similarity of the two works alone. A defendant must rebut an inference of access. So, really, lack of access does not do much when it comes to not being sued in the first place, which I believe is the concern of Chessex.

"I didn't know about it" is a perfectly fine response to allegations of copyright infringement because copyright only protects against copying. It is impossible to copy something unless you have the thing you intend to copy in your custody or control. This is actually a very good way to demonstrate that copyright really is only about copying.

I cannot photocopy something unless I have the original.

Now, when it comes to patent infringement and trademark infringement, lack of knowledge of the asserted property isn't so much a defense. One can infringe a patent unwittingly because patent rights give the inventor the exclusive right to make, use, sell, or offer to sell the patented invention. So if someone makes, uses, sells, or offers to sell the patented invention, it does not matter whether or not that person knew it was patented, exclusive rights have been infringed. It is similar with trademark infringement, although if you didn't know about the mark (assuming it was unregistered), one may presume that the mark is weak or not terribly distinctive.

But at the end of the day, likelihood of confusion is the test for trademark infringement. One can cause a likelihood of confusion unwittingly.

One can create a copy accidentally, but not without knowledge of the asserted work, because copyright only protects against copying, and copying requires that you have the asserted work in your "hands" prior to creating an infringing work of art.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
GW has a copyright on Earth, as it's the planet the emperor is from. Am I doing it right?

Yep. The planet is referred to as "Terra," but we all know "Terra" means "Earth" so they get "Earth" too because, well, you knew exactly what you were doing living on GW's planet.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

fishy bob wrote:
Could Games Workshop go after these "Design your own T-shirt!" sites too? Cause I would love to walk into my GW wearing a shirt saying "Space Marine", with an arrow and the Roman numeral 4.

That is hilarious. I am making those shirts now. Hello Cafe Press!

Trasvi wrote:
It is very common for any 'print your own X' shops to get you to sign a disclaimer saying that it is your own copyright on the work. Chessex might be just doing due diligence here because a huge percentage of their business derives from GW players and they know that GW is litigious. But they could have the same issue if you tried to print out Mickey Mouse dice and Disney got word of it.
If they were making money off printing a GW design that you gave them, GW would have a legitimate copyright claim (assuming they own the copyright). If you tell them with a straight face that it is your own design (or sign a document saying that it is) the blame transfers to you.

Some of GW's claimed copyrights might be bogus, but others are legitimate and you need to be careful if you choose to do anything with those.

There's a difference in the Disney scenario compared to the GW one. Disney actually does produce dice with Mickey Mouse Ears on them (I bought some thinking they were cool). So Disney would have a legitimate complaint and issue should a company make dice with MM ears on them. Also, I'm pretty sure the MM ear design has been Disney trademark for decades back to the days of Walt.

 weeble1000 wrote:

fishy bob wrote:
Could Games Workshop go after these "Design your own T-shirt!" sites too? Cause I would love to walk into my GW wearing a shirt saying "Space Marine", with an arrow and the Roman numeral 4.

That is hilarious. I am making those shirts now. Hello Cafe Press!

Here's a T-shirt I'd pay good money for. Even if for just walking into a Games Workshop store and see what reaction I'd get.

Those need to be given away at the front doors of gamesday.

 Ravenous D wrote:

That's the thing though, a lot of GWs "symbols" are straight up stolen from other sources and claimed as their own.

GW may very well not own those images. I doubt many/most of their claims would stand up in court. But that's irrelevant.

What is relevant is that Chessex has no intention of getting bogged down in such a case for whatever reason, for good or for ill.

This is the second instance in the past month of Chessex saying no that I've read here. This is the first.

Edited

 Ravenous D wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 insaniak wrote:
I'm not seeing the problem here. GW have every right to stop unlicensed third parties from using their artwork.

It depends on what is "GW's artwork".

The Alaitoc symbol is a cogwheel with two cogs extended to follow the shape of a sword symbol placed over it, and a crescent moon over all.

If it expresses originality of art, then it is worthy of protections, the same as anyone else's original work.

OTOH if it has strong similarities to other works, then perhaps it is not original enough to be worthy of protection.

It would need an art historian to research this point. I can't help feeling it is too trivial to be worth the time.

Secondly, GW will probably claim trademark status for the Alaitoc symbol, which means it doesn't need to be original.

Heres what I sent, both are different from the "official GW design"

That looks different enough to me. It's a sword through a crescent moon. Just because GW owns one design of a sword through a crescent moon, doesn't mean they own ALL designs of a sword through a crescent moon.

So due to this development, is there any public domain symbols that could represent 40k armies?

Well for Blood Angels, a drop is about as generic as it gets. Whether you call it a blood drop, a rain drop or any other liquid.

There's enough European heraldry to cover most of the Imperial forces. The Zoroastrian eagle done in stark contrast would be really close to the Imperial eagle. Just replace the human figure with two birds facing away from one another.

A cog is a fairly generic symbol that can represent Mechanicus stuff.

As has been shown, Medieval alchemist symbols work great for Eldar (as that is wherr GW stole them from).

The Tau sept symbols are just circles within circles with the areas separated by lines. You can probably find some traditional circle art that looks a lot like that.

Tyranids are big nasty monsters. So anything works well there. A shark head that ends right before the gills would work perfectly.

There really isn't anything original to the symbols representing GW's factions, so finding something should be fairly easy.

And the way to get Chessex to make the dice is to mention your source when you send in the design. Don't ask for "tyranid dice" when you can request they use this shark head symbol image you came up with. Call your eagle "medieval German heraldry dice". If you want a templar cross, don't mention "black templars" in your order.

 Howard A Treesong wrote:
Unless they furnish Chessex with a list of designs before they take orders for designs there's an argument for reasonableness.

They did.


I had some custom Dark Angels dice made by Chessex last summer. In December 2012 I contacted Chessex to make some inversions of those (opposite colors - same symbol). They informed me they had received a warning letter from GW with a list of symbols and images that they were not allowed to use.

I fully support Chessex on this - there is NO reason anybody should doubt or interfere with their desire to stay out of GW's way legally. And as a heads up to all of you - they are extremely nice and helpful people over at Chessex. Great guys. Give them a call and they will help you out as much as legally possible. I'm a huge fan.

You know what really grinds my gears?

This is the ONE market where GW could license their trademarks and have 100% control over the products design. I guran-damn-tee that Chessex would be fine with a licensing deal where they could sell dice with GW logos on them and GW got a cut.

GW doesn't make those items, so it's not direct competition, and even if GW did want to make them, I'm sure Chessex would end up being the manufacturer.

Stupid. GW insists on raising prices instead of finding new ways to monetize their IP.

Would be interesting to see that list and compare it with the rejected claims in the CHS lawsuit (once the verdict is final).

I may "enjoy" a good GW kicking like anyone else but I figure GW should be able to intervene on directly competing product with their artwork.

Some measure of IP protection needs to be done.

I would suggest finding something that may have "inspired" GW and point to it and say "no it is not a GW artwork: see link". All is good then.

 Talizvar wrote:
I may "enjoy" a good GW kicking like anyone else but I figure GW should be able to intervene on directly competing product with their artwork.

Some measure of IP protection needs to be done.

I would suggest finding something that may have "inspired" GW and point to it and say "no it is not a GW artwork: see link". All is good then.

How is it a competing product? GW don't make custom dice, in fact no one buys dice from GW anyway as they are the same price as their weight in gold, most people buy dice from ebay or a cheap toy/game retailer. Would it be so difficult for GW to turn to chessex and say "ok you produce dice with our symbols on, we get 20%". Instead GW stop people making a product they are unable or unwilling to provide.

Ugly Green Trog wrote:

 Talizvar wrote:
I may "enjoy" a good GW kicking like anyone else but I figure GW should be able to intervene on directly competing product with their artwork.Some measure of IP protection needs to be done.I would suggest finding something that may have "inspired" GW and point to it and say "no it is not a GW artwork: see link". All is good then.

How is it a competing product? GW don't make custom dice, in fact no one buys dice from GW anyway as they are the same price as their weight in gold, most people buy dice from ebay or a cheap toy/game retailer. Would it be so difficult for GW to turn to chessex and say "ok you produce dice with our symbols on, we get 20%". Instead GW stop people making a product they are unable or unwilling to provide.

GW does sell multiple forms of dice (custom dice are not custom if they copy elements of someone else's) as you say and cost of gold or not: they are allowed to protect their IP.
"No one buys dice from GW anyway" is incorrect or they would never bother producing it. I have seen a few people using their dice so I fail to see your point by observations or on a legal basis.

It is within GW's ability to license out their IP as you propose but they choose not to for better control. Once licensed out airtight terms need to be laid down for their use, it is usually easier to prevent them being used at all.
GW has a legal right to be as possessive and selfish with their imagery and writings as they want, what makes people upset is when they start selling it "like gold" and we see them making other people look elsewhere for gaming.
There have been instances where they start tromping on people who have a confirmed history of their IP and could go after GW if they had deep pockets, that is when we break out the torches and pitchforks.

If it was sold at a fair price and they used common customer service practices, and licensed or bought innovative add-on product from other companies (picture if they had the add-on of the week with prizes? ) we would not be having these discussions.

This whole thing is depressing..

Really hard to believe the small-time hobby I grew up with has turned into this legal groin-to-face thrusting at every opportunity, over this kind of crap that surely only matters to a few people working in a legal department?

'Protecting their IP' ? Really.. give me a break, this whole thing would be hilarious if it wasn't so sad.

The symbols obviously have some value, or people wouldn't a) be trying to get dice made with those symbols; and b) be getting so worked up about not being able to.

 Janthkin wrote:
The symbols obviously have some value, or people wouldn't a) be trying to get dice made with those symbols; and b) be getting so worked up about not being able to.

I don't think anyone much disputes that Janthkin, but how much value, and how protectable? The reaction also has a lot to do with the company's history of enforcement .

Certainly the symbol does not have enough value for GW to use it as a trademark or even prominently on any product. At the end of the day, licence deals, especially with an established and trusted company like Chessex, would seem to be a fair and reasonable way for GW to handle such issues.

But that is not how GW thinks:

Andy Jones

Well, that just can't be right. It's ours. It's in our book. It's up to us when we want to release that product, and it might be we might release it at the same time as we release the book, we might release it six months later, it might be something we're saving up for two years later. That's our choice. That's for us to do with our characters and our stories.

From CHS's rule 59 motion: Paramount Pictures Corp. v. Romulan Invasions, 7U.S.P.Q.2d 1897, 1900, 1988 WL 252376 (T.T.A.B. 1988) (appearance of the Romulans as characters in the storyline of television series or movies did not make Romulans a trademark); In re D.C. Comics, Inc., 689 F.2d 1042, 1043, n.1, 215 U.S.P.Q. 394 (C.C.P.A. 1982) (“the appearance of the JOKER in a story in a BATMAN comic book does not make the JOKER a trademark for the book”). GW’s intentions to create a product in the future are irrelevant.

What is the true crime with all these copy write issues was that the system was designed to bring trade secrets to the light to allow for innovation.

They were supposed to get exclusive use of the idea for 7 years and then it is released to public use.

Presently it is so far removed from this it is ridiculous. It is strange I admit seeing all these Lego like product out there now their design is no longer protected. Wonder when GW has theirs expire?

 Talizvar wrote:
What is the true crime with all these copy write issues was that the system was designed to bring trade secrets to the light to allow for innovation.

They were supposed to get exclusive use of the idea for 7 years and then it is released to public use.

Presently it is so far removed from this it is ridiculous. It is strange I admit seeing all these Lego like product out there now their design is no longer protected. Wonder when GW has theirs expire?

I think you are confusing copyright with patents. Patents are specifically short termed so that future innovators can build on previous technologies and improve them after the original creator has had some time to profit from their idea.

Copyright is to protect artists from being ripped off, but is now abused to great length by corporations who only care about the profits tied to said works, and not to the artistic integrity of the work itself.

It is corporations that lobby for copyright durations to be extended, and as deadlines come up for them you see those companies pushing for longer terms. Iirc copyright in the US is the life of the artist +70 years from time of death. So Mickey Mouse would theoretically expire December 15, 2036. As that date gets closer(assuming it's 70 years, not 100% on that detail) then we'll see Disney pushing for copyright terms to be extended even longer, and we all know they have the money to line the right pockets to pull it off.

It's an abuse of the system that was designed to help PEOPLE protect their work, not corporations.

As Weeble pointed out, inclusion of artwork or ideas in a book or even film does not equate to trademark, and the aforementioned design has questionable protective elements if any. That is precedent, and not an arguable fact.

 Aerethan wrote:
I think you are confusing copyright with patents. Patents are specifically short termed so that future innovators can build on previous technologies and improve them after the original creator has had some time to profit from their idea.
Copyright is to protect artists from being ripped off, but is now abused to great length by corporations who only care about the profits tied to said works, and not to the artistic integrity of the work itself.
It is corporations that lobby for copyright durations to be extended, and as deadlines come up for them you see those companies pushing for longer terms. Iirc copyright in the US is the life of the artist +70 years from time of death. So Mickey Mouse would theoretically expire December 15, 2036. As that date gets closer(assuming it's 70 years, not 100% on that detail) then we'll see Disney pushing for copyright terms to be extended even longer, and we all know they have the money to line the right pockets to pull it off.
It's an abuse of the system that was designed to help PEOPLE protect their work, not corporations.
As Weeble pointed out, inclusion of artwork or ideas in a book or even film does not equate to trademark, and the aforementioned design has questionable protective elements if any. That is precedent, and not an arguable fact.

You are correct, I did confuse with patents vs. copy-writes. My bad.
What I worry about is a corporation has the same rights as a person which I would love to know how the life of the artist is determined since a corporation has no real life span.
70 years is a long time so arguing the fine points of what a copy write can cover is the meat of the issue: I have to hit the books more....

Copyright is also intended to be limited, just like both patents and trademarks, and was originally intended to have a far, far, far shorter term of protection than copyright now affords (thank you Disney). The purpose of copyright, as with patents, is to allow a creator to profit from a creation, after which time it becomes of use to the public.

The most salient difference is that copyright is inherent, whereas a patent is essentially a contract with the government.