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Yesterday I put the Populous (architecture) logo on a sign for their Kansas City office and I was struck by how simple and generic it looked. Populous is an international firm that dominates the market for designing large sports venues like Yankees Stadium in New York, Wembley Stadium in London, Soccer City Stadium in Johannesburg and many, many others. The company's logo is simple type with no ornamentation. It does not meet the criteria for US copyright protection. [IMG][/IMG]
For a work to have copyright protection, it must meet a certain level of originality. Most simple logos do not meet the criteria. Many ornate logos do meet the criteria.
According to the US Copyright Office, things that are not protected by copryright include, among other things, "titles, names, short phrases, and slogans; familiar symbols or designs; mere variations of typographic ornamentation, lettering, or coloring..." —Copyright Basics, Circular 1, page 3, US Copyright Office.
That covers a lot of logo designs. Most of them? [IMG][/IMG]
The Subway sandwich logo is more ornate. There are embellishments and stylized lettering. Does it have copyright protection? Nope. And what about Best Western and Geek Squad? They all tried to get copyright registration for their logos but were denied. The Hot Wheels logo, however, was granted copyright registration. Go figure.
In the final analysis, to most companies, it doesn't matter that their logos cannot receive copyright protection. Because trademark law protects them. And trademark protection is far more suited to safeguarding logos.
Subway owns the trademark "Subway." If another sandwich shop calls its sandwiches "Subway" sandwiches, it is likely an infringement, even if their signs don't look like Subway signs. What if a sandwich shop makes signs that look like Subway signs, but the name is not the same? It could still be cause for a lawsuit. The criteria for determining infringement has to do with, among other things, whether confusion could be caused in the minds of consumers. From a distance, red, white and blue stripes on a real estate sign could make people think the property was listed by ReMax, or perhaps that the company listing the property was associated with ReMax. So these stripes are protected by trademark.
Trademark law protects colors, shapes, even sounds associated with products or services. No other telecommunications company can use the T-Mobile shade of magenta in its advertising, for example. The color is protected by trademark. The shape of the Coca-Cola bottle is protected. The NBC chime is protected.
In simplest terms, copyright prevents copying. Trademark prevents confusion in the marketplace.
So whether logos can be protected by copyright or not can often be viewed as a moot point. Trademark law usually provides all the protection needed.
Here is an article from Plagiarism Today discussing the overlap that sometimes occurs in copyright and trademark protection for logo designs. It's written by a non-lawyer so it was easier for me to understand:
-------------------- Brad Ferguson See More Signs 7931 Wornall Rd Kansas City, MO 64111 signbrad@yahoo.com 816-739-7316 Posts: 1230 | From: Kansas City, MO, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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i had an incident back in 2002-3 with signs now. their president called me and told to cest and desist using the name on my mobile sign truck SIGNS HERE & NOW. he said that i infringing on his copywrite/trademark. and if i didnt they would bring a law suit. i politely told him, to give me his name & number as i would get back to him as soon as i spoke to my LAWYER)))) he kinda scoffed at this and said, "you have a lawyer?" i said yes and that i would get back to him in 30 minutes.....i called my brother in law in tenn, who happens to be lawyer and he does this kinda work.))))) i called and told him what sign now said. the way i had the mobile sign vehicle "as a division of" A SIGN MINT. darrel(brother in law)told me to tell them.....he would be glad to take their money.......)))) i clled the pres back, and he was again being a putz...he siad YOU can afford a lawyer? so i said to him, YES.....and he will do this for ME pro-bono, and he told me to tell you....he would be happy to take your money!!!!!! hahahahaha end of conversation))))) never heard from him again. [IMG][/IMG]
[ September 05, 2015, 05:53 PM: Message edited by: old paint ]
-------------------- joe pribish-A SIGN MINT 2811 longleaf Dr. pensacola, fl 32526 850-637-1519 BEWARE THE TRUTH.....YOU MAY NOT LIKE WHAT YOU FIND Posts: 11582 | From: pensacola, fl. usa | Registered: Nov 1998
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Joe, How cool that your brother-in-law is a lawyer. He obviously saw your van as a very weak case for infringement of the Signs Now logo.
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It is obvious that the Signs Now logo looks nothing like the design on your van. The standard for determining COPYRIGHT infringement is that there needs to be "substantial similarity," some courts say, "probative similarity." The 12 circuit courts differ a little on how they figure this out, but it needs to be obvious that one work is a copy of the other, even if some changes were made to the copy.
Probably the Signs Now owner thought your van a TRADEMARK violation. The Signs Now logo does have trademark protection, or they would not be allowed to place the circled R symbol on their sign work. Note they have a trademark symbol on the tag line as well in one variation of their logo. If you haven't registered your trademark with the US Patent & Trademark Office, you can't use the R. You can use the TM symbol, which just means you claim trademark, but you can't use the R.
Sounds like your brother-in-law did not see evidence for a trademark infringement, either. The standard for trademark infringement is determining whether there is a likelihood of confusion that consumers will believe the products or services originated from the trademark owner. Trademark protection is not so much to protect something from being copied, but to prevent confusion. Would someone looking at your van, for example, think you were associated with Signs Now? Your brother-in-law did not think so.
By the way, one interesting thing about US trademark law is that you can claim trademark infringement even if your trademark is not registered. Many countries require that your trademark be registered before you can sue. Under US copyright law, by contrast, you must have a registration before you can sue for copyright infringemnt.
Some other differences between copyright and trademark: Penalties for infringement are not the same. They are potentially much greater for trademark infringement.
The lifetime of a copyright is commonly the lifetime of the author plus 70 years. The lifetime of a trademark doesn't have this restriction. It stays in force as long as it's maintained.
The US Copyright Office is under the oversight of the Library of Congress. Copyright protection was written into the Constitution. It's Federal law. A lawsuit for infringement must originate in Federal court. Trademark laws are found at both Federal and state levels, and in the US there are common-law provisions. Trademark is under the supervision of the US Patent & Trademark Office, part of the Department of Commerce.
Copyright registration is relatively cheap. Trademark registration, not so cheap.
-------------------- Brad Ferguson See More Signs 7931 Wornall Rd Kansas City, MO 64111 signbrad@yahoo.com 816-739-7316 Posts: 1230 | From: Kansas City, MO, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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it wasnt his contention that i was using his LOGO, but THE WORDING...........SIGNS HERE &now.......the inclusion of the word NOW in the same context as SIGNS was where he was basing the harassment of me ....with. IF...... i woulda had SIGN NOW & HERE... on the truck......he woulda had reason to bug to me......but since i had SIGNS HERE.....and just an add on "now"....it bore no resemblance to SIGNS NOW.....also it wasnt the primary name of my business which is stated on the truck as ....mobile division of A SIGN MINT. so again he had nothing. also it was not a registered name......only on the truck.
[ September 06, 2015, 01:01 PM: Message edited by: old paint ]
-------------------- joe pribish-A SIGN MINT 2811 longleaf Dr. pensacola, fl 32526 850-637-1519 BEWARE THE TRUTH.....YOU MAY NOT LIKE WHAT YOU FIND Posts: 11582 | From: pensacola, fl. usa | Registered: Nov 1998
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I see what you mean, Joe. The Signs Now guy was claiming a trademark infringement because of the wording, not the logo design.
Out of curiosity, I looked up the trademark registrations for Signs Now. It looks like there are separate trademark registrations for both the wording and the logo. But your brother-in-law was surely right that the guy didn't have much of a case against you.
Wish I had a lawyer in MY family.
Brad
-------------------- Brad Ferguson See More Signs 7931 Wornall Rd Kansas City, MO 64111 signbrad@yahoo.com 816-739-7316 Posts: 1230 | From: Kansas City, MO, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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i am fortunate ..........i also have a friend in sarasota.......i met him there, did some computer work for him as he was vacationing in sarasota. i never really paid much attention to to what he did.... you know most lawyers have an office building. come to find out after many years of talking with him, he has an OFFICE in cleveland oh........that is a whole skyscraper!!!!!! j. norman stark building, you can google it. i had bought a used truck in 2007-8 from a 5 star dodge dealership. reason i say this is they tried to get me to pay for a repair to the vehicle(less then 30 days, and it should have been fixed before it was sold) situation was the salesman sold me the truck, with ZERO MONEY down!!! so i got nothing invested YET)))) i took the truck home. next day i checked the oil, it was down 2 qts. i filled it and then drove to sonny franks met near atlanta. 325 up. i checked the oil just before i left his meet, as i was going to dive another 325 home.........it was AGAIN 2 qts low. i added the oil, drove it home. next day i checked the oil, AGAIN 2 QTS LOW!!!! like i said i got ZERO MONEY in this. i drove it to the dealership....into their service line. guy said what the problem. i told to FIX HIS TRUCK.....as i wasnt coming back to get it. i told i put 6 qts of oil in it in 4 days and 700 miles. i will not make a payment on a piece of junk!!! and as far as i was concerned i didnt want the truck. welllllllllllllllll you can imagine the schit i set in motion)))))) 1st the service manager calls me a said they can fix the truck for $800.00)))) and i laughed at him))) told him where to stick the truck. couple days later he calls back.....now they decided to split the cost with me. they would pay half and i would still have to pay $400)))) was then i informed him that in my past, i worked for NAPA, outside sales and knew all the crap that service depts do......and that i knew to fix the problem with the truck was $20 GASKET under the intake manifold and that it SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN SOLD till that was fixed!!!!! well to say the least they were highly upset with me so they called the bank that had the loan. i told them the same thing.....wasnt gona put any money ito a piece of junk. they threatened me with destroying my credit.........i told the best thing they could do was to FIX THEIR TRUCK.. that they owned...NOT ME)))) ths bring me back to j.norman stark. called him told what was going on. he told me to write 3 letters. 1 to the bank, 1 to the dealership and 1 to chrysler corp....and he added..."joe on the bottom of the letter say.......any further inquiries should be addressed to....and write my name under it, attorney at law.phone number and address in cleveland. long story short....the dealership fixed the truck and garonteed it would not use oil))))rescheduled my payments))))))) surprising what just a name on aletter can do)))))
-------------------- joe pribish-A SIGN MINT 2811 longleaf Dr. pensacola, fl 32526 850-637-1519 BEWARE THE TRUTH.....YOU MAY NOT LIKE WHAT YOU FIND Posts: 11582 | From: pensacola, fl. usa | Registered: Nov 1998
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SIGNS NOW...... i think it was there old logo....... everytime i saw it i read SIGN SNOW)))))
-------------------- joe pribish-A SIGN MINT 2811 longleaf Dr. pensacola, fl 32526 850-637-1519 BEWARE THE TRUTH.....YOU MAY NOT LIKE WHAT YOU FIND Posts: 11582 | From: pensacola, fl. usa | Registered: Nov 1998
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