Check this out, can someone tell me if this is legal?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2174364046&category=3987
Wouldn’t that be kind of like drawing Mickey Mouse and selling it on Ebay?
IANAL, as long as they don’t try to pass it off as officially licensed material, I don’t see any problems.
Since when is Batman a Smurf?
IAAL, and I think it is pretty clear Tradmark violation.
IANAL either. But it’s being marketed with direct reference to two trademarked characters. So whether it’s pretending to be official or not is irrelevant.
So, without proper licensing (which isn’t mentioned on the page either way) it is not legal.
Carl Barks, the guy who drew he original Donald Duck cartoons, started making oil paintings of the Duck characters. After a while, Disney forbade him to make such paintings. Only after a number of years did they again allow him to make such paintings.
This site is one of the sites that mentions this history; Google on ‘Carl Barks paintings’ for more.
I’m not sure whether Disney prohibited Barks from painting by invoking copyright, or by using a possible employer-employee contractual relationship.
The issue is whether Time Warner knows about it. They also may be willing to turn a blind eye and not go through the trouble.
However, they certainly can sue for trademark infringement. Also, Ed McGuinness may have a copyright case, too.
Don’t ever mess with Disney.
I worked as a cake decorator in a Wal-Mart, and every time a new Disney film came out we would start getting the calls. “Can you do an Ariel cake for my daughter’s birthday?” “Not until we get the official stencils and figures” “Ah, I wouldn’t tell” But somebody else might."
Disney is pretty agressive about their characters. We never risked it because of this. Sure, we could do a mermaid, even one with red hair, but NOT recognizably Ariel.
A copyright is a copyright. You can’t use someone else’s property(their characters) without their specific permission. I would think the person on E-Bay is a thief.
I think people are confusing copyrights with trademarks. Comic book characters can be trademarked, but not copyrighted.
Violation or not, I’m sure the corporate lawyers will be glad to issue a “cease and desist”, just out of hopes the artist will cave in without a challenge.
Why should the artist be allowed to challenge? What he is doing is completely illegal, as has been made very clear already.
Where on earth did you get this idea? You can’t draw Mickey Mouse or any Disney character because of the copyright laws, what makes Batman and Superman any different? They are all “characters”.
In this case, I agree. However, I was thinking of other cases, where overzealous lawyers go after borderline issues just to protect the rights of their corporate clients.
No, you can’t use Mickey and the Disney characters due to trademark laws, not copyright laws.
Tangible forms of expression, such as movies, stories and pieces of artwork, can be copyrighted. The suitably distinctive characters, logos, and identifying names, however, are trademarked. There’s a difference. See this article for more info.
Disney are hypocrites, for most of their material are from public domain.
Marvel knew long ago that allowing drawings made by others, as long as they don’t sell them as coming from Jack Kirby, etc, is good and free marketing for them. That’s why for example they don’t crack down on comic book awnings featuring Spider-Man.
I should add that it is ordinarily the name of a company or product which is trademarked. However, when it comes to cartoon and comic book characters, [url="http://www.intelproplaw.com/Copyright/Forum/msg/6801.shtml"the character itself can be trademarked as well. In contrast, specific tangible depictions of that character (say, in a story or a drawing) are copyrighted.
Because everyone has a right to a fair trial?
There’s a reason the copyright extension act (i.e. the sonny bono act, which was the subject of the recent Eldred v. Ashcroft case) is called the Mickey Mouse Preservation Act by cynics. Every time mickey mouse, which is copyrighted, is about to fall into the public domain, copyright terms get extended (retroactively) to keep that from happening. To draw a mickey mouse and sell it is to make an unlicensed derivative work and try to make money off of it. If you just draw it for your own pleasure nobody would care, but selling it on ebay is violative of the law. Certain well-known characters can be trademarked as well as copyrighted, but they protect different things.
Perhaps the person is selling it as pop art or something postmodern? shrugs
But the person is selling it, period. Therein lies the problem; once he/she attempts to make a profit off of it, the whole shebang becomes illegal.
This is also why high school artworks are denied entrance into competitions if the art is a trademark or copyright violation. You’re not allowed to profit off the trademarks or copyrights legally held by others.