Takara Tomy beginning to take action against 3rd products in Japan?

[kaiden]

http://www.seibertron.com/transforme...n-japan/21281/

basically a japanese retailer Red Mercury reports they have received a warning from Takara Tomy to stop selling 3rd party custom products on the grounds of copyright and trademark infringement.

RM have cancelled preorders for the following

iGear Kup Head Set
iGear Bee 01
Perfect Effect SFX Scouting Force X - Camera Set
TFC Toys Primary School: Primars
Head Robots Blood
Crazy Devy CDMW-16
Crazy Devy CDMW-17

[Sky Shadow]

Excellent. About bloody time.

[kup]

It will blow over, it's only in Japan and so far just a single shop. I hope the 3rd parties get their act together, most of them are beginning to release just as much crap as Hasbro.

[Vector Prime]

Excellent. About bloody time.

+1

[gdmetro]

About bloody time- I love 3rd party stuff, but also want to see Has/Tak protecting their property...

This will not really affect anyone outside Japan. From my understanding, it seems the only thing it will substantially do is make Japanese collectors import rather than get the items from a store.

Even if the same pressure is applied elsewhere, I don't think it will affect much. Most of these products come from China and we all know how stringent their legal system is especially with regards to stuff like this.

Also notice how none of the FP stuff has been targeted? Perhaps this validates that FP designs do not encroach on the IP enough to be actioned against. Or it could just be a minor oversight.

I think the biggest culprit is Igear- by a wide margin. Rumors from other boards that they "borrowed" the injection moulds for the MP seekers to redesign for their cone-heads.

[kup]

Also notice how none of the FP stuff has been targeted? Perhaps this validates that FP designs do not encroach on the IP enough to be actioned against. Or it could just be a minor oversight.

Awesome point! FansProject is the only company that has actually gone through a huge effort not to step over the line and infringe on copyright despite the obvious similarities in their products to official TF characters. As it has been argued before, Defender may look like Springer but when you study and compare the Hasbro toys/character models in detail, there is actually very little that is similar. The most prominent aspect is the colors theme that tributes the official character and even that is not 100% the same and there can't be copyrights on color.

On the other hand, the same could be argued about Headrobot's stuff as they too have been careful with copyright infringement but they didn't scape Takara's notice despite 'Blood' being little more than a generic skull head when disembodied.

[1AZRAEL1]

I think IGear is being targeted because they are pushing it to the point that they are taking it too far in some cases. Look at the Coneheads and small MP Primes. Those are taken straight from the original molds, just modified. Whereas FansProject have created something new.

[Hursticon]

Personally, I'm glad that some form of action is finally being taken against those 3rd Party groups that obviously stray too far from legitimate practices and I hope Japan is just the beginning.

It also inadvertently recognises the efforts by those 3rd parties that make the extra effort to make sure that they don't infringe on copyrighted IPs by merely paying homage.

Though this sort of practice will never truly be stamped out completely, I hope too that this will see the end of the oodles of pointless 3rd party crap that has been riding the waves of success that those like Fansproject have created.

[UltraMarginal]

Interesting I think, I've always had issue with things like the third party seekers, smaller MP primes even the warbot defender is pushing it a bit far I think. But I love the add ons like the MP roller, city commander and even the newer rodimus trailer. they are items that enhance current HasTak products, that can't fit into the budget of a retail product but for fans, are a little bit of icing on the cake. It will be interesting to see how HASTAK treat this in the long run.

I am designing some stuff myself for my seekers, and 20th anniversary prime, hopefully I will get it in the next week or two and be able to show it off.

[FFN]

I think IGear is being targeted because they are pushing it to the point that they are taking it too far in some cases. Look at the Coneheads and small MP Primes. Those are taken straight from the original molds, just modified. Whereas FansProject have created something new.

I don't think Hasbro/Takara are happy with Fansproject essentially making Springer, Blast Off and Swindle, either (along with Broadside and the probably-canceled Junkions). Original toy engineering designs, but obviously based upon characters FansProject don't actually own.