| |
Dave Baum <dbaum@spambgoneenteract.com> wrote:
> However, they are wary of people using (and possibly abusing) the Lego
> brand. This is understandable...the brand has a lot of value and they
> wouldn't want poor-quality products by third parties to in any way
> compromise that brand. Furthermore, since the brand has such high value,
> it is perfectly reasonable for them to expect payment for use of their
> brand (i.e. licensing fees).
However, it seems extremely unreasonable in the case of books about a
product. In fact, although I'm not a lawyer, this use of trademarks seems
100% within the precedent set for fair use: it's impossible to describe
_without_ using the trademark.
The classic example is: if writing about the Boston Marathon (a trademark of
the Boston Athletic Association), you don't have to call it "that 42.2k race
they have in Boston every year" -- you can actually call it "the Boston
Marathon". The same applies to a book specifically about Lego Mindstorms --
you don't have to call it a book about "the robotic construction set from
the famous maker of interlocking plastic building blocks".
I can understand why O'Reilly wouldn't want to go to court over this, but
I'm pretty sure that if it came to that, TLC wouldn't have much to stand on.
--
Matthew Miller ---> mattdm@mattdm.org
Quotes 'R' Us ---> http://quotes-r-us.org/
|
|
| |
Matthew Miller <mattdm@mattdm.org> wrote:
> I'm pretty sure that if it came to that, TLC wouldn't have much to stand on.
Not to mention, of course, the whole thing where these books are nothing but
beneficial to Lego, and much more beneficial if they actually use their name
in the title.
(To make another analogy: a book called "How to use Linux" is nice for Red
Hat; a book called "How to use Red Hat Linux" is much better. And I'm pretty
sure that no one is confused into thinking that such books are official --
especially if they happen to be called something like "The Unofficial Guide
to Red Hat Linux".)
--
Matthew Miller ---> mattdm@mattdm.org
Quotes 'R' Us ---> http://quotes-r-us.org/
|
|
| |
In article <slrn8esvg9.qk9.mattdm@jadzia.bu.edu>, mattdm@mattdm.org
wrote:
> Dave Baum <dbaum@spambgoneenteract.com> wrote:
> > However, they are wary of people using (and possibly abusing) the Lego
> > brand. This is understandable...the brand has a lot of value and they
> > wouldn't want poor-quality products by third parties to in any way
> > compromise that brand. Furthermore, since the brand has such high
> > value,
> > it is perfectly reasonable for them to expect payment for use of their
> > brand (i.e. licensing fees).
>
>
> However, it seems extremely unreasonable in the case of books about a
> product. In fact, although I'm not a lawyer, this use of trademarks seems
> 100% within the precedent set for fair use: it's impossible to describe
> _without_ using the trademark.
There's tons of precedent on using trademarked names in titles of books.
I don't believe my publisher was ever seriously concerned about losing a
court case. But they didn't want to bother going to court, and there's
a lot of value in a good faith effort such as respecting their wishes
and putting an "unofficial" stamp on the book.
Bear in mind that TLC is sort of an "old" company that's just coming
into the "new" market. They're used to customers and competitors. Not
collaborators and side industries.
I'm not saying they shouldn't change...they should. However, big
companies don't turn on a dime, so I have to keep tempering my
expectations.
We have seen a lot of progress (at least in Mindstorms)....consider the
fact that they released pre-alpha firmware for RCX 2.0 along with
complete documentation of the bytecodes. That must've been a hard sell
to management.
Dave
--
reply to: dbaum at enteract dot com
|
|
|
