The Soapbox XII: The Convenient Truth

[dirge]

Nice excuse, but still an excuse.

I don't buy 3rd party stuff. There's no excuse here.

HasTak don't do accessory kits for Transformers. So the potential for loss of revenue is miniscule, if at all. The potential for loss of revenue is MUCH greater from KOs.

The majority of fan-produced items are not produced with any intention to compete with HasTak for market (leaving aside stuff like Drift). KOs clearly are. Sure, some of the fan-produced items will end up overlapping the retools, but they're certainly not designed with the intention of stealing HasTak's potential market.

I completely understand this argument, but these ARE NOT original accessories. It's like someone besides Mercedes selling Mercedes logos for Mercedes bonnets.

How is it like selling a Mercedes Logo? Where are the registered trademarks on fan produced items? If you want to bring branding into it, show us the branding on the fan produced items which are designed to take the place of HasTak products. Otherwise you're drawing a very long bow.

Most if not all fan accessories do NOT use copyrighted or trademarked images/names on their packaging. Copyright does not extend to items designed to work with a branded item, unless they mislead the consumer into believing the item is genuine or licensed. City Commander is specifically designed to fit a HasTak branded item, just as a Calidad cartridge is designed to work in a HP printer. It will _refer to_ HP on the packaging, and is directly competing with HP for business. If anything, the producer of the generic cartridge is closer to a copyright infringement, since they've reverse engineered the print head and such. And that's wholly dependent on HP's patented product and IP.

Either way, producing a product to fit another specific product is not, in itself, violating copyright. If it were, the generic printer cartridge manufacturers would have been out of business a LONG time ago.

To someone unaware that could be deceiving, but a very large part of the KO market is create by those that are aware, and have thus created much of the demand for this market.

Yeah and those who are actively buying KOs, while fully aware that they're buying KOs, aren't able to point the finger at KO producers. I don't think anyone's disputing that. What we're discussing is the KOers intention to deceive. Sure, most of us know that the KOs are just that, but the producer is setting out to produce something deceptive, and are flagrantly using HasTak's IP to do it..

You're pointing to the fact that many KO buyers are aware of the fact it's a KO. That doesn't get the producer off the hook, since the producer's intention still remains to produce something that's counterfeit.

There's a huge difference between the deliberate and blatant counterfeiting of a KO producer and a producer of a fan item who is producing something that is designed to work with a product, who takes care to avoid violating copyright. IP protection does cover using the names and trademarks of productions in fiction. It doesn't extend to reverse engineering a product to work with someone else's product. The proliferation of generic printer cartridges proves that. And yes, that HAS been tested - printer companies have gotten into trouble for denying warranty repairs for use of 3rd party cartridges.

Frankly, I'm not convinced that (most) fan produced items are anywhere near level of IP abuse as the KOs. The analogy on about Mercedes logos is a poor argument when most fan items aren't setting out to take the place of HasTak items, they specifically ensure they're not confused for HasTak merchandise, and avoid any sort of official branding while KO producers flagrantly use trademarks and patented items that doesn't belong to them. They're one ones using the logos.

As for the ethical arguments presented, there's a huge gulf in intention between a fan item produced to supplement a HasTak item and a KO designed to take the place of one. The fact remains most fan items - while produced for profit - aren't designed to take the place of HasTak products as KOs are. Sure there are fan items which do take the place of HasTak items/step on IP (the Drift toy is an example), but that's closer to a KO, the way it deals with HasTak's IP.

STL asked the question about is there a difference, and pretty much everyone who who has responded has said yes - including many such as myself who buy neither (and aren't looking to make any sort of excuse for themselves). I don't see why those who claim there is a difference are being shot down with such determination. Why encourage a discussion only to dig one's heels in when presented with alternate points of view? Those defending the original viewpoint are heading further and further into legal hypotheses to defend the original point of view, which was more about ethics than legality.

STL doesn't see the difference between KOs and fan items, and he's welcome to that stance. But this thread feels more like an attempt to convince the world of this opinion than to have a meaningful discussion about whether or not there is a difference.

I'm not trying to point the finger at STL (and it's nothing personal), by the way, but this thread feels more like a crusade to put across one viewpoint than an attempt to generate meaningful discussion. I'm generally a fan of the soapboxes, but in this case I can't help but feeling the original argument just doesn't stack up at all - no matter how it's reworded. So yeah, I'm done with it. Bring on XIII.