Legal issues over depicting World War Two equipment

Loco-S · #1 03-30-2008, 05:43 AM

I think that what most companies fail to understand is the concept of "free advertising"..just imagine, you get a deal with Grumman to include a small video of what a great brand it is, that they built some of the finest aircraft on WW2, and that they still use the same care and technology advances in their current products....or Boeing/Douglas...to include the real deal ( with the cool logo on the control yoke on their planes)...this people fail to see a good platform to advertise their products to new consumers via branding of their products on mass media.

Free publicity...in a day when you have to pay 22,000 bucks to put a full page add on a magazine, you can not beat the free part.

imagine something like this on a game box:

aircraft depicted in this game are courtesy of "insert name here" manufacturer of high tech "aircraft/satellite/etc", please see our website www."manufacturer".com to learn more about us.....bling....more people learn about them, and they can actually increase the sales of whatever they do , 75 years after they made that product depicted on the game....for free.

TooCool · #2 03-30-2008, 05:13 PM

Former Older,

All that you say sound nice, but there's a small problem:

NGC never sued against microsoft, as far as I know. why? maybe because microsft may be a too big oponent in court?.. or, maybe, simply because microsoft made certain that no CFS box had any company name on it.

From what I've understood, defense firms threatened to sue ubi, 1C etc, because they used their trademarks on the packages... WWII planes, as such, do not belong to them, as they were financed by tax money.

What's more, I don't remember seeing any company sueing developpers for other games before, nor do I remember them sueing any developper putting online planes like the Grumman Goose and such for FS...

I take planes" photographies... I have a Grumman Wildcat that's displayed in my web gallery... maybe they should sue me too? after all, I published a representation of a plane they built... I even had one of my pics published in a magazine.. figuring a Chance Vought Corsair taking off... why don't they sue me and the magazine who published it?

the reason is simple: it's not about the representation (because, if US law is based on precedency, it's already too late to complain, they've let go for decades), but just because of the inappropriate use of their company name...

Former_Older · #3 03-30-2008, 09:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TooCool

Former Older,

All that you say sound nice, but there's a small problem:

NGC never sued against microsoft, as far as I know. why? maybe because microsft may be a too big oponent in court?.. or, maybe, simply because microsoft made certain that no CFS box had any company name on it.

From what I've understood, defense firms threatened to sue ubi, 1C etc, because they used their trademarks on the packages... WWII planes, as such, do not belong to them, as they were financed by tax money.

What's more, I don't remember seeing any company sueing developpers for other games before, nor do I remember them sueing any developper putting online planes like the Grumman Goose and such for FS...

I take planes" photographies... I have a Grumman Wildcat that's displayed in my web gallery... maybe they should sue me too? after all, I published a representation of a plane they built... I even had one of my pics published in a magazine.. figuring a Chance Vought Corsair taking off... why don't they sue me and the magazine who published it?

the reason is simple: it's not about the representation (because, if US law is based on precedency, it's already too late to complain, they've let go for decades), but just because of the inappropriate use of their company name...

I'm unfamiliar with the issues you're talking about. Could it be that Microsoft didn't break the law?

Or because MS did what Ubi should have done, and could have:

asked permission to do it?? Ubisoft is not an innocent little kid, they are supposed to be in world business

This:

"because, if US law is based on precedency, it's already too late to complain, they've let go for decades"

is confusing to me. What do you mean to say? "The US" has let too much go? Northrop Grumman? The two aren't the same thing you know. It's also very hard to take a blanket statement like "because, if US law is based on precedency, it's already too late to complain, they've let go for decades" and defend it. You must realise that each case of violation of a company's rights is potentially different. You can't say "Oh well, too late, everything goes now". For one thing, of course that statement is too broad to be so. For another...the courts don't care

So, if I understand you here, you're saying that it's OK for UbiSoft to have broken the Law, and because it was NGC's rights that were violated, it's ok, and the reason is because it doesn't much matter

On the one hand I can see that you're debating this with your gut feelings- of course you know that the reasons you cite are not a good enough reason for UbiSoft to go around breaking US Law. I don't care if Microsft violated more laws, it still doesn't make what Ubi did OK. These things don't cancel out. Ubi isn't forgiven X number of violations of law for every Y number of times MS does it

On the other hand I can see that you don't appreciate that if you don't feel that NGC should be protected by US law, why should US law protect individuals or other businesses? "Ah, he had it coming. That guy had too much money. Serves him right that he got robbed" What?? You can't really feel that way

Every time I try to explain these things, somebody treats me as if *I'm* Northrop Grumman and *I* did this

Ubisoft did it. Get mad at Ubisoft. I don't care who also broke the Law, it doesn't excuse Ubisoft's poor business and illegal practices. People get mad at NGC over this becasue that's what they've read only: "Northrop Grumman did this!". Heaven forbid anyone actually look into it, oh no! Just go with what the mob yells and that's good enough- and the reasons? Public Domain, the good old "it doesn't matter", "It's our heritage", and the oldie but goodie "Tax money paid for it". Big deal. The US government owned the planes but the designs are property of the firms that designed and/or purchased them. Just becasue the US government bought a P-51, that doesn't mean they own the rights to the design. Do you own the rights to the design of the car you drive?

When a likable guys robs some rich jerk...the likable guy is the criminal. It doesn't matter that he robbed a jerk, people just do not think this through

Rama · #4 03-30-2008, 10:46 PM

Former_Older
You don't know more than anybody else here the details of the letter Ubisoft received from NGC lawyers, neither the content of the agreement between NGC, Ubisoft and Oleg.
Nobody except the 3 parties do know, and they wont tell anything since they agreed to keep it confidential.
So you can't say "it's Ubisoft fault", as nobody can say "it's NGC fault" or "it's Oleg's fault"...
Everything said on these forums is nothing but unfounded guess and as usefull as to talk about sex angels.
Wouldn't it be better not to talk about?

GF_Mastiff · #5 03-31-2008, 04:34 AM

it just that now I'm seeing more and more collectibles get the same treatment all of a sudden. I.E. 1/32 scale vehicles, trains, planes. Just the other day I bought a BF109 F-2/F-4 and it had the Boeing logo on it?! Boeing didnt make that plane! WTF now their making it more expensive to get these memorabilia. You don't see the train dealers doing it to there scale models.

GF_Mastiff · #6 03-31-2008, 04:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rama

Former_Older
You don't know more than anybody else here the details of the letter Ubisoft received from NGC lawyers, neither the content of the agreement between NGC, Ubisoft and Oleg.
Nobody except the 3 parties do know, and they wont tell anything since they agreed to keep it confidential.
So you can't say "it's Ubisoft fault", as nobody can say "it's NGC fault" or "it's Oleg's fault"...
Everything said on these forums is nothing but unfounded guess and as usefull as to talk about sex angels.
Wouldn't it be better not to talk about?

Yes lets pound our head in the sand and close our eyes to such things!

Al Schlageter · #7 03-31-2008, 06:18 AM

Actually, the railroad companies have been putting it to the model railroaders for some time now.

Rama · #8 03-31-2008, 10:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GF_Mastiff

Yes lets pound our head in the sand and close our eyes to such things!

What things?
It won't help you to open your eyes and your ears when there's nothing to see or to hear.

Nobody knows what exactly happened, and everybody's speaking in the vacuum

GF_Mastiff · #9 03-31-2008, 02:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rama

What things?
It won't help you to open your eyes and your ears when there's nothing to see or to hear.

Nobody knows what exactly happened, and everybody's speaking in the vacuum

this is what happened.

Quote:

The "door opening" factor was the failure to properly mark the Grumman name on the package art (I have it here in my lap). That's open and shut, and in fact, the companies in question are required to defend their marks for fear of precedent that it is open for use. Ubi was over a barrel at that point, and the negotiators decided to ask for fees as precedent. Now they can claim that companies have been forced to pay for images of their products that would otherwise be "fair use." That's my guess, anyway.

the fair use is now gone, since they paid out and made it precedent.

Former_Older · #10 03-31-2008, 10:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rama

Former_Older
You don't know more than anybody else here the details of the letter Ubisoft received from NGC lawyers, neither the content of the agreement between NGC, Ubisoft and Oleg.
Nobody except the 3 parties do know, and they wont tell anything since they agreed to keep it confidential.
So you can't say "it's Ubisoft fault", as nobody can say "it's NGC fault" or "it's Oleg's fault"...
Everything said on these forums is nothing but unfounded guess and as usefull as to talk about sex angels.
Wouldn't it be better not to talk about?

Your first statement:

"You don't know more than anybody else here the details of the letter Ubisoft received from NGC lawyers, neither the content of the agreement between NGC, Ubisoft and Oleg."

does not support your second statement:

"So you can't say "it's Ubisoft fault", as nobody can say "it's NGC fault" or "it's Oleg's fault"...
Everything said on these forums is nothing but unfounded guess and as usefull as to talk about sex angels."

I'm sorry, but yes I can know whose fault it is. 1C:Maddox Games did not do the box art. UbiSoft did. They were the publisher. As tater points out, this "opened the door"

So while I know nothing about the finite and precise details of the legal case, I do know it was Ubi's fault.

But tell me more about these angels