In 2007, we bought some fireworks for Cracker Night. The fireworks were mostly Chinese made, with labels that contained various images, presumably collected from the internet and slapped on to make the products cool and exciting. Star Wars, Batman, Predator, etc. My favourite was this one:
So, GW, off you go to China with your lawyers and have a word with these people!
Not likely. GW isn't a Chinese company, so even if they were able to get it before a court, the odds of them winning are low.
ReplyDeleteOf course, miricles do happen. GW has a guardsman with a lasgun's odds against a landraider though.
LOL at the odds...
ReplyDeleteI don't expect that there would be much of a case - like you point out, it's a Chinese firecracker company, they are using copyright imagery but not really threatening sales of the game/figures. Also, there would only be a small market for fireworks (in Australian states there is usually just one weekend a year when firecrackers can be let off by anyone but professionals).
I guess GW could argue that by letting a random company use GW imagery on a non-game product, they are 'diluting' the brand name - next time some one could make Space Marine t-shirts, Space Marine lunch boxes etc.
But it has probably been noticed by GW, and it's up to them how far they want to take it.
There are plenty of trademark images in those fireworks - Transformers, Batman, Star Wars, etc. I wonder what it would take to stop the importers or distributors. Those people operate in Australia, so local laws might be applicable. Perhaps the ACCC would step in if GW (or WB, Lucasfilm, etc) requested it? Not likely though...