HD is still a big bully.

[Bonez]

Cunts. Thank goodness they've fucked off to Fielding.

https://advrider.com/harley-davidson-sends-a-cease-and-desist-order-to-local-diner/

[JimO]

copyright...

[ellipsis]

...all brands will extol the virtue of commercial law and their names and litigate against those who abuse their commercial right...


...ffs, they tried to patent the, potato, potato...Maccas tried to screw a family called McDonald who had a chippy, burger shop in the far north of Scotland, McDonalds lost, the family biz won...

[onearmedbandit]

Hmmmm it would be nice if we lived in a world with 'precedents'. But we don't. If HD allow them to use their logo, it opens a floodgate of anyone else allowed to use it for commercial purposes.

[ellipsis]

Hmmmm it would be nice if we lived in a world with 'precedents'. But we don't. If HD allow them to use their logo, it opens a floodgate of anyone else allowed to use it for commercial purposes.

...agreed, in a commercial sense...and that's what make all this shit we do, work...

[pritch]

This quote from the HD letter describes their problem.

“ if we were to allow this type of use to continue, we would risk losing the value of our trademarks.”

If a company does not promptly defend their rights to a copyrighted item that will be viewed in court as them no longer wanting the copyright. Thus we have Harrods UK writing to a shop in Otorohanga, and the West Coast Blackball Hilton receiving a letter from the Hilton hotel group.

The press love to report these things as "David and Goliath battles" but very few will ever get to court, it's just a necessary formality.

[HenryDorsetCase]

Yes what Pritch said. In EVERY case where a rights holder becomes aware of this they HAVE to do this. If they don't they are seen as abandoning their trademarks so anyone can use them. Its a "Feature" of intellectual property law.

The good news is that HD got a bill from JAWS (James and Wells) or whoever for like 2 grand plus GST for sending a form letter, so there's that.

This is also very common. There was a childcare centre that had to paint over Disney characters, and of course the "Blackball Hilton" (now "Formerly the Blackball Hilton".

What these people do is repaint over the Hardly Ableson logo, with an Indian Motorcycle one. They'd likely welcome the extra publicity.

Or, make it into Harley Sucks. or something funny.

There will be some bleating and so forth but the target business should be able to get some more good publicity out of it.

TL;DR: non story.

[HenryDorsetCase]

Hmmmm it would be nice if we lived in a world with 'precedents'. But we don't. If HD allow them to use their logo, it opens a floodgate of anyone else allowed to use it for commercial purposes.

law school says otherwise... (about precedents I mean)

[F5 Dave]

Saw some vehicle painted up day before, think it was called Roadrunner rentals or something with actual cartoon pictures. Yeah, like that's licenced...:rolleyes:

C'mon prick. Just because you don't have an original idea doesn't mean you can just rip off someone else's, big or small company.

Harley seem like the bad guy here - but what have they really done wrong?

Correct- it's to make crap motorcycles.

[onearmedbandit]

law school says otherwise... (about precedents I mean)

It would appear I've been schooled today, I was under the impression commercial rights against even small businesses were practiced to avoid bigger companies doing the same. Cheers.

[pritch]

There was a childcare centre that had to paint over Disney characters,

There was mural on a building in New Plymouth depicting Disney characters, it was really very well done. Then came the letter.

There followed an exchange of corespondence the upshot of which was that if the painting was changed to make Donald Duck smile instead of look angry, Disney would approve the painting. Whether they actually licensed it, or whatever other mechanism was used I don't know, but the painting was allowed to live.

[Swoop]

I wonder how many letters they send out to people with a tatoo of their logo?