Contact the editor at karina@plainlanguagemedia.com Consider, for a moment, the following situations: EA Sports uses likenesses of well-known college athletes as characters for its video games Samsung uses images and bios of legendary Olympians for its “Genome Project” app Pitbull mentions Lindsay Lohan in a song lyric Abercrombie and Fitch uses a famous surfer’s photo in … [Read more...] about Right of Publicity & Using Celebrities Without Permission
Law
Right of Publicity: Where Does Your State Stand?
The right of publicity comes from state rather than federal law—via statute or common law (i.e., case law) and, in some cases, from both sources. But there are also 18 states that don’t recognize an individual’s right of publicity. Here’s a geographic rundown. Learn more about how the right of publicity plays into the unauthorized use of a celebrity for commercial … [Read more...] about Right of Publicity: Where Does Your State Stand?
Licensors Poised to Lose Millions in Royalties
The Hollywood Reporter reports that top entertainment and music companies like Discovery, CBS, Fox, and NBCUniversal are facing millions in lost royalties if a planned bankruptcy auction of Delivery Agent goes through. Delivery Agent was founded in 2005; the company runs digital platforms that sell licensed merchandise and has generated more than $800 million in revenue. After … [Read more...] about Licensors Poised to Lose Millions in Royalties
Legal Roundup
Here's a screenshot of three deals gone sour. Playboy is enjoying a $7 million unanimous verdict in a breach-of-contract lawsuit against Play Beverages and CirTran Beverage. The jury found that the two companies (they have the same principal, Iehab Hawatmeh) committed counterfeiting and willful trademark infringement by selling and marketing energy drinks using Playboy’s marks … [Read more...] about Legal Roundup
What Not to Do: Kardashians Score a Win in Fight Against Licensee
By Karina Masolova The Kardashian sisters got a pretrial court order barring Haven Beauty from using their names and trademarks—effectively opening the door for new licensees to step in, since the Kardashians want to ultimately terminate their licensing agreement. The Aug. 23 ruling, from the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California (2Die4Kourt v. Hillair … [Read more...] about What Not to Do: Kardashians Score a Win in Fight Against Licensee
Fewer Marketing Requirements & Shorter Contact Terms
The following is an excerpt from TLL's feature story on royalty rates. See the complete run-down here, including breakdowns by each channel and full data charts. Fewer Marketing Requirements Imposed The percentage of respondents saying that they pay into or require a contribution to a central marketing fund (CMF) continued to trend downward, falling from 45% in 2014 to 41% in … [Read more...] about Fewer Marketing Requirements & Shorter Contact Terms
Licensee Accusation: Asics Deliberately Tried to Drive Us Out of Business
By Glenn S. Demby, Esq. What Happened: Asics gave Windsor Financial Group, LLC, financing and exclusive rights to open and operate 13 Asics stores, including flagships in Boston and New York. The deal was supposed to run for 20 years but a couple of years in, Asics terminated the agreement. As a result, Windsor had to close the stores and eat the millions of dollars it had … [Read more...] about Licensee Accusation: Asics Deliberately Tried to Drive Us Out of Business
Unlicensed Use of Trademark Brands in Video Games
EA shows Bell Helicopters in its Battlefield 3 video game Activision depicts the "Delta Force" logo in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 In Sony's Gran Turismo 6, race cars pass under a bridge displaying the Virag® trademark Video games look and feel more realistic when they depict brands from real-life. But using a trademark brand without a license can also result in … [Read more...] about Unlicensed Use of Trademark Brands in Video Games
TM Ruling Helps Licensing in China
In a landmark case, Chinese officials recently allowed a foreign company, fashion designer Michael Bastian, to block a third-party squatter from stealing its trademark. No foreigner had ever won one of these cases in China, but after five years of litigation, the Chinese Trade and Arbitration Board rejected the squatter's registration of the "Michael Bastian" mark, finding it … [Read more...] about TM Ruling Helps Licensing in China
Legal Trap to Avoid: Control Licensee Quality or Risk Losing Your Trademark
A winery’s only quality control is the occasional sip and knowing that the licensee’s winemaker has a “world class reputation” (Barcamerica Int’l USA Trust v. Tyfield Importers, (2002)); A bridal franchise collects no royalties and exerts no control over how licensees run their shops (Eva’s Bridal Ltd. v. Halanick Enterprises Inc., (2011)); An internet network trusts its … [Read more...] about Legal Trap to Avoid: Control Licensee Quality or Risk Losing Your Trademark