Winter is Coming

[OneFootInTheGrave]

In 11 days to be precise.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/12/08/winter_is_coming_hbo_dmca_trademark/

A father says lawyers at the cable TV network demanded his 13-year-old daughter's artwork be taken off the internet after she drew a lovely picture titled "winter is coming" and posted the image to arts'n'craft website RedBubble.

"My daughter, who happens to be autistic, was doing an art challenge called Huevember which consisted of doing a piece of art based on a different colour as you worked your way round a colour wheel," Jonathan Wilcox, of Edwinstowe in the UK, told The Register on Thursday.

"She was uploading her pictures to a variety of sites and sharing them on Facebook. For this particular piece, she decided to title it 'winter is coming.' I do not believe she uploaded the picture to RedBubble to make any particular financial gain, she just thought it a sensible place to put it."
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According to HBO's legal team, the above illustration infringes the entertainment giant's intellectual property from its hit TV show Game of Thrones: HBO owns US trademarks on a line repeatedly used in the series, "winter is coming."

Brave new world. Welcome to the 21st century.

I am thinking of trademarking "Hi mom!" and "I am hungry."

[Proteus_MST]

Reminds me of Jack Wolfskin (who have the imprint of a wolven paw as logo).
They went as far as sending cease and desist orders to handicraft forums ... to housewives/mothers whose "crime" ist was, to publish knitting patterns that included dogs or cats paws (that resembled a wolven paw a little bit).
One should add that in germany it is the recipient of a ceae and desist order, who has to pay the costs of the lawyer who sends them to him ... not the company for which the lawyer works (the reasoning behind this is, that the ceaser and desist order spares tzhe recipient, to be sued by the company ... and therefore the lawyer works in bets interest of the recipient).
Meaning that said recipient were faced with 2 choices:
Either accept the cease and desist order (meaning that they would have to pay several hundreds ... or even more than thousand ... Euros ... and also be faced with the prospect of having to pay an even larger fine if anytime in the future they would get caught with publishing any pöatterns (or clothes) with paw imporint that resemble a wolven paw)
Or not accept the cease and desist order (making it likely that they would have to go to court (which would give the company all advantages, due to higher financial means and also having the free choice of the court at which the trial would take place))

(well, actually AFAIK Jack Wolfskin finally withdrew said cease and desist orders ... but only after a lengthy PR ****storm they faced, when the cases became public)

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Never heard of that case, but an interesting reference, also good reason not to buy their products. It's not like they are the only jacket maker in the world.

[Proteus_MST]

Aye, it is ridiculous ... unfortunately german laws on cease and desist orders (i.e. the passage that the recipients have to pay for them) encourage the lawyers to send out as many cease and desist orders as püossible, nop matter whether they are justified or not ... especially against "normal people" who don't have the juristic knowledge amnd/or money to fight them actively in court.
That turned lots of lawyers into robber barons (the most notorious of them, Günther von Gravenreuth, even tried to register the term "Webspace" as his own trademark ... which would have enabled him to send cease and desist oirders to lots of homepage owners and -providers. Fortunately this went too far even with german cpatent and trademark office and they denied the request)

Here is a good writeup to the Jack Wolfskin case:

http://fledgeflyingiseasy.blogspot.de/2009/10/reason-to-paws.html

[Aeson]

Now you've doomed us to an HBO cease and desist

[OneFootInTheGrave]

I hope that the hand of the law is not that long.

[Aeson]

We actually get take-down notices from time to time. Mostly for stupid stuff like some B rate public figure (not a poster) trying to remove quotes of something stupid they said at some point in the past.

[N35t0r]

Is that enforceable?

[Proteus_MST]

Is that enforceable?

In germany regarding forums, it would be ... they first have to send you an informal notice about tgheir rigjhts getting infringed (with a date till removal getting mentioned (AFAIK something around 1-2 weeks)
If you haven't reacted and removed the infringing postings/materials until this time, they can send you a cease and desist letter (for which, as I mentioned, in germany the recipient would have to pay, i.e. the owner of the forum (meaning costs of several hundreds to thousands Euros (at least if the forum has banner ads, which automatically makes it a "commercial website" according to german law)))

You may ignore or reject the cease and desist letter, but the lawyers then have the option of fighting the case on court (resulting in possibly much much more costs for you, if they win the case)

[rah]

If you're hiding behind proxy servers, identifying you could be difficult.

[N35t0r]

I meant Aeson's post about removing stuff people have said.

[rah]

NEVERMIND.