Movie megatron worth buying if it were done like this.

[dirge]

You don't license a toy from Hasbro, like you do a music recording or a piece of software. You purchase it and own it. You don't own the rights to reproduce it, but once you own it, the seller (in this case Hasbro) has no legal ability to dictate what you do with it, granted you don't infringe on their trademarks in the process.

Fine, but modifying it to mimic an existing Hasbro product (in this case, Thunderwing) may infringe on those trademarks. Only if you sell it - you're not trading otherwise.

Otherwise, based on what you're saying, if you wanted to sell a second hand Transformer, you couldn't refer to it as a Transformer.

You're not passing anything off as your own work there - and I don't see how you think Goktimus is making that claim.

[jaydisc]

This is the comment that throws me:

Thunderwing on the other hand is Hasbro's intellectual property and one could perhaps argue that this custom, being a mere unmodified repaint, is too similar to movie Megatron too (so it's simultaneously infringing on two of Hasbro's properties).

I read this as Gok saying that there would be two infringements with this custom:

1. The infringement of using the potentially trademarked name and likeness of "Thunderwing"

2. The infringement of the fact that selling a modified Megatron is too similar too... Megatron.

The first I agree with:

granted you don't infringe on their trademarks in the process.

The second is the point I'm disagree with, granted I interpreted it correctly.

My point rephrased: There is nothing infringing about the act of selling a repainted or modified toy.

Addendum: I also believe that in this case, the seller could continue to use the terms Megatron and Transformer without infringing.