Yep, strange that it wasn't already taken really!

Lots of visits from Joe 6 pack I expect  

The disclaimer covers a lot of ground. Talk BB's problem was that it used one of the tm words in its name and also that they openly sort donations, therefore (in GW's eyes) making money from their product name.

Every GW fan site should have that disclaimer somewhere within the site.

I have that disclaimer in Raiders... Twice.

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author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

It could turn out a whole new crowd playing BB!

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Actually, neither of those is inherently an infringement.

From GW's response:


This is an outright lie.

It not inherently unlawful or an infringement to use another party's trademark.  It is only infringement if you are doing something to create confusion or damage the brand.  As long as there is not infringement, I can use a trademark freely and even make money off of it.

I could, for instance, start a forum site called "www.thecamaroforum.com" and as long as I made it clear that "Camaro" is a trademark of GM, the board is not sponsored by GM, and I wasn't doing something to tarnish the brand, then it's fair use.  I can sell memberships, advertising, whatever.  There are a few cases where a URL has been judged by its very nature to cause confusion, e.g. "panavision.com" but they are few and far between.  "Talkbloodbowl" hardly fell in that category.


And, again, so people know I'm not pulling this out of my butt, I work in an office that deals with medical research and patentable inventions.  Several of the attorneys in the office have prior experience in copyright and/or trademark law, one of whom used to have the full time job at a law firm that manages copyright licensing and trademark enforcement for the music industry here in Nashville (aka "Music City").  I went and laid out the situation to her and she said without any hesitation that as long as the site had an appropriate disclaimer GW had absolutely no case.

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Neal

Thanks Neal.
And this is exactly why GW choose to send a C&D instead of a court appeal (or whatever it would be). They know they have no case so they intimidate instead.

http://www.chillingeffects.org/ is a good place to start ones studies in C&D.

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It would be nice to get lightspeed,
so far we can only reach slight speed.- Erik M
092b85658e746a91d343e53509d357744e56f641

Heh, if that market segment moved over to BB in any significant amount, 40K would suddenly find itself on the back burner while GW struggled to rush little lead football guys into mass production.  Heck, the U.S. would become a pillar of GW's busines!  They could even relocate GW corporate to Tulsa...

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WAAARGH!!
The Lost & the Dipped

Wouldn't that be ironic?  

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"I don't believe in destiny or the guiding hand of fate." N. Peart

They've gone after FUMBBL now. They've also sent C&D letters to a guy who spent an amazing amount of time helping with the Living Rulebooks.

Who is it?

Specifics from the FUMBBL C&D...

"
* the Website contains copies of Blood Bowl statistics and rules;
* tje Java Bowl programme contains various pieces of GW Blood Bowl art including the Blood Bowl pitch and Blood Bowl logo; and
* the Java Bowl programme uses all the Blood Bowl rules and statistics for each model.
"

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Uti possidetis, ita possideatis.
May your beer be laid under an enchantment of surpassing excellence for seven years!
An online epic force creator: Armyforge

As always, there are important differences in US and UK IP law, but...

Use of the rules as written in the rulebook and art is a copyright violation.  If they really are doing that, then GW is obligated to take steps or lose their IP protection.

I can't address anything about the Java Bowl program without seeing it, but it is possible that it violates GW IP as they claim.  Both the nature of programs and GW's track record make me think it is unlikely, but it's technically possible.

That said, this part of their letter is false with respect to US law:

It is true that they do not have to file a copyright for it to exist.  

However, there is a designation in copyright law called a "derivative work" regarding the creation of a new work that is "substantially based on" the prior work.  A legitimate derivative work owes nothing to the creator of the original work.  For example, an academic paper can include fairly extensive copyrighted quotes without violating the original.  Another thing most people will be familiar with is parodic use.  The question of how much of the original can be used and in what method varies based on all sorts of factors, some of them subjective, but it still renders their absolute statement false..

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Neal

Strange. I thought the Blood Bowl rules are free as all SG game rules?
How can it be an copyright infringement if i use free stuff?

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We are returned!
http://www.epic-wargaming.de/

I think you still retain copyright even if you give away copies for free.

From GW...

"Please be aware that all PDF files downloaded from this website are Copyright © Games Workshop Limited 2008 and that you must abide by our terms of use policy when downloading and using our internet resources."

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws....start=4

(seems like these links don't work because the ampersands are getting escaped twice: '&' becomes '&' when it should be '&', anyone got a fix?)

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Uti possidetis, ita possideatis.
May your beer be laid under an enchantment of surpassing excellence for seven years!
An online epic force creator: Armyforge

Funny how only after the TBB site has playtested their rules for upmpteen years to help GW bring it to V5.0, and just on the release of 6.0, they decide on enforcement.

Nice slap in the face for their fans.

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