daveh@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Haynie) (08/21/87)
in article <1015@pixar.UUCP>, banzai@pixar.UUCP (Eric Herrmann) says: > Keywords: scoobydoobedoo doo-wap Pixar chakachaka > > Ok, you say, but a juggling red unicycle, well, _I_ could have thought of that. > Ok, I say, you could have thought up a talking mouse, too, and made a hell of > a lot more money/fame/whatever-turns-you-on, but someone beat you to it, and > now you can't sell MM t-shirts, because you'd be ripping someone off, and they > have more lawyers. There are lots of animated and/or talking mice (Jerry, Speedy, the Nimh mice, etc.), in Disney's case, Mickey (or Willy) was maybe the first, and certainly the most lasting. Like the difference between a DaVinci portrait and others, maybe. No one has a copyright on talking mice, but there are lots of copyrights on SPECIFIC talking mice. That's where the creativity come in. Similarly, Pixar holds a copyright on Red, but certainly not ALL juggling unicycles. If it looks like Red, you've violated their copyright. If you've got a juggling unicycle that's obviously a different character (like Speedy vs. Mickey), there's no copyright infringement, on the character at least. > George Benson, apparently, won't allow unapproved pictures of his face to > be published. His face is copyrighted, and all instances of his face must > have the (C) stamped on his forehead. It's generally true that you can't use anyone's face, whether Mickey Mouse, George Benson, or Jimmy Buffet for that matter, in print, movie, etc. that's a strictly for-profit deal. Photographers have a form called a "model release" they have you sign if your face is identifiable in a photo they take. I'm sure movie folks have a similar thing. However, in a journalistic context, like an auto accident, I could photograph any of the above crawling from the burning wreckage without a model release (well, it might be difficult to get Mickey in such a situation, though you could certainly get a human in a Mickey costume); that's a feature of the first amendment that (to my knowledge at least) hasn't been challenged by anyone other than maybe Sean Penn's fist for quite some time. >>Time to break down and do the recumbent bike juggling balls before Pixar can >>move in and get the exclusive copyright on that eh? 1/2 :) > Oh, incidentally, Pixar is starting a library of ALL POSSIBLE 3 minute > animations on videotape (VHS and BETA, don't worry). We will generate, > in sequence, all possible patterns on a screen and then combine all of those > frames into all possible movies. We then will claim copyright on all of this > work. Anything you produce thereafter will be OUR PROPERTY, and you will > never work again. Even the static on your TV between stations will be OURS, > and we will claim royalties on their transmission. Now come on. Leo's already released the TV static thing to the public domain. Unless ViaCom's copyrighted it.... > That doesn't follow from our discussion. We were discussing whether or not > Pixar had a right to keep Leo from distributing his work. Apparently, his > work falls under our copyright. So, he can't distribute without our > permission, which it happens that we don't want to give out, so that we > can exercise our right to distribute through normal channels. Ergo, > he won't distribute his work. In a few months, you'll see RD with the FOA, > and in a year or so you can buy it on video tape. Simple enough? In actuality, no one really knows if Leo's work falls under the Pixar copyright, as it's never been defended in court. Pixar feels that it does, and to Leo's credit, he's willing to admit that his work did derive from the Pixar demo and to voluntarily abide by what Pixar requests without going to court. As pointed out before, reguardless of any violation, Pixar would outlast Leo in any court battle. > I suspect that as a company name, the name Pixar is trademarked, but I don't > see little (tm)'s anywhere, neither have I heard of any policy telling us > to use them. I think it would only matter if another company put out a > machine called a Pixar. Hey, maybe we can sue AT&T(tm) for putting out their > Pixel machine, which is obviously so similar to ours. Then, we can go on > to sue Epyx games. This is great! And I guess whomever first coined the term "Pixel" will go after Pixar. Gee, only IBM is safe, since they use PELs, not Pixels. Maybe that's why IBM uses "Fixed Disks" and "30mm Floppies". No kidding here, with all the goofy copyright claims I've heard going around, maybe IBM thinks it's worth the added aggrevation of making their own names for everything for the sake of free use of that name. I think maybe the next Amiga will have TEBLs (Tiny Electronic Blips of Light) instead of Pixels, 3.0 cm PSEDMs (Plastic Shelled Electro-magnetic Data Medium) instead of 3.5" floppy disks, and Mongo Disks instead of Hard or Fixed disks.... > Just say YES! Eric Herrmann ucbvax!pixar!banzai -- Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga Usenet: {ihnp4|caip|rutgers}!cbmvax!daveh "The A2000 Guy" PLINK : D-DAVE H BIX : hazy "God, I wish I was sailing again" -Jimmy Buffett, Dave Haynie