6 ms·
Have to be honest, I've always thought complaints about trademarked products in works of fiction were a silly thing to begin with. Why shouldn't a fictional uni
by CM30 7y ago
Have to be honest, I've always thought complaints about trademarked products in works of fiction were a silly thing to begin with. Why shouldn't a fictional universe feature products and businesses found in the real world? Are we supposedly to randomly assume all other universes don't have humvees or macbooks or the Red Cross? Who's to say the same people/companies/organisations would even be responsible in that work of fiction?
The law should basically just say there's no trademark violation in featuring a real world product/service in a fictional work so long as it couldn't reasonably be confused as a piece of marketing by the creator of said product or person. Obviously the work shouldn't be about say, Mickey Mouse, but it should be perfectly fine to feature say, Disney and their products as background elements in a fictional work without the approval of Disney.
Just seems ridiculous to have it work any other way.
- saagarjha 7y agoWhat if I took your product and had it fail spectacularly in my movie?
- ceejayoz 7y agoIs it being marketed as a documentary?
- saagarjha 7y agoLet’s say it isn’t.
- csallen 7y agoThen why should it be illegal? Sure, as the maker of said product, I won't be happy seeing it portrayed in a negative light. But bad reviews, negative jokes, and outright mockery are a natural risk that comes from the totally optional endeavor of creating products. Should my feelings trump your rights to creativity and speech?
- danShumway 7y agoWhy should your product be protected from that? Consumers are smart enough to know that fictional media is fictional. If we're not protecting products from negative reviews, opinion peices, or satire -- then fictional stories seems to me like a really weird place to draw a line. What if I took your product and made a joke about it having ties to a cult?[0] I don't see any reason to treat fictional movies and games like they're a special medium. I also assume we're not proposing that people should be banned from making fictional stories that feature real events and people. So jumping off of that point, what makes a movie that incorporates a public, trademarked brand different than a movie that incorporates a living public figure? [0]: https://entertainment.theonion.com/new-sesame-street-character-shudders-to-life-as-produ-1840391716 https://entertainment.theonion.com/new-sesame-street-charact...
- saagarjha 7y ago> Consumers are smart enough to know that fictional media is fictional. Well, it depends. Generally there is some sort of minimal realism when it comes to objects; you'll never have a sports car lose to a clunker, and when it does, the movie plays it as surprising. If people treat your product in a certain way, even in fiction, consumers might think that they're just missing out on the association they're supposed to know.
- danShumway 7y agoThe number of car chases I've seen in movies where motorcycles, taxis, and trucks keep pace with fast-moving vehicles makes me skeptical that is a real concern. But let's say that we are concerned about consumers forming an incorrect association. If that was the case, we also would block brands from showing their products succeeding spectacularly in unlikely or impossible situations. If we don't trust consumers to treat fictional stories with caution, then we should also ban depictions of cell phones that have infinite reception in the middle of disasters, cars that allow drivers to walk away unharmed after crashes, or branded laptops that perform computing tasks that are beyond them. Just a few weeks to a month ago, studios were joking about how Apple had a policy of making sure that movie villains never used iPhones. That's a clearly deceptive association Apple is trying to create, lots of evil people in the real world use iPhones. The fact that we don't ban deceptively positive depictions of branded products is strong evidence that we do trust consumers to know the difference between fiction and reality.
- ummonk 7y agoWhat if I wrote a bad review of your product and claimed it fails spectacularly? E.g. what Top Gear did with the Tesla Roadster.
- izacus 7y agoWhat if? Nothing. It's a dumb product, there joke is over and you move on in a few seconds. There's no real need for this wired free speech limitation to protect something as dead as a brand.
- ummonk 7y agoExactly. I don't see why games should be treated any different than bad reviews.
- fiblye 7y agoAdvertising would very quickly shift from promoting your product, to actively trashing the competitor's. The whole "Our soda taste so much better than the unnamed competitor's!" style advertising would quickly change to something like "X Corp Brand Soda is the biggest supporter of elephant extermination worldwide and uses lead to give their product their sugar-free sweetness. Is their soda really worth it? (haha, just kidding. Or are we?)" Smaller companies would be absolutely crushed by larger corporations dragging them through the mud with political style ads all day.
- ummonk 7y agoYou seem to be under the false impression that companies aren't already allowed to trash their competitors in advertisements.
- umvi 7y agoWhat if I have characters in my movie watching your movie and commenting on how stupid of a movie it is?
- vl 7y agoYou mean like A320 in Sully?
- rospaya 7y agoThis reminds me of Apple's policy recently made public by director Rian Johnson, that can spoil multiple movies. * SPOILER AHEAD * While Apple will let you use an iPhone on film, they won't approve it being used by a villain.
- ceejayoz 7y agoThat’s just if you want them to pay for the product placement, though.
- Supermancho 7y agoIf you want to use it at all in a movie or tv.
- hannasanarion 7y agoApple can't stop you from using their products in a movie. Trademarks only protect brand confusion, nobody is going to watch Transformers 17: Age of Voltron and think that the whole movie is an apple product because a robot turns into a iPad. It's just a case of "if you don't use our product this way, we won't do cross promotions or pay for product placement with you anymore"
- Supermancho 7y agoApple does not do product placement at all, so licensing fees make no sense for Apple. I stand corrected.
- ceejayoz 7y agoThey absolutely do, just not in the standard way. https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-product-placements-in-tv-and-movies-2012-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-product-placements-in-... They give away devices, to studio, cast, and crew. Apple puts your movie prominently in ads or on the iTunes Store. etc.
- endorphone 7y agoIf it failed in a way it can fail in the real world, ideally with examples, then there should be no problem. If the movie doesn't extrapolate and effectively libel the brand with untruths (e.g. they all do this, this is normal, etc), there should be zero problem with it. Brands, music, trends, etc, are always a street with two-sides, yet we act like there is only one side worth consideration. e.g. These things are the part of our lives as well, and we made them what they are, so there is shared consideration, which is exactly what this judgment is saying.
- norifukuoka 7y agoMeanwhile, in this other fictional universe, a guy who looks just like you and posts the same things as you on HN is a child pornographer. Not to worry, our hero stops him. Or perhaps it is your company that is involved in the pornography. And they are secret Nazis. Not to worry. All fictional.
- Koshkin 7y agoWell that's what Freedom of Speech is all about, isn't it?
- macintux 7y agoNo, slander and libel are well-established legal principles despite freedom of speech.
- hannasanarion 7y agoAnd fiction is never libel. Libel requires a falsehood about someone to be presented as truth, causing demonstrable damage, with actual malice.
- sio8ohPi 7y agoThis simply isn't true. See for instance Batra v Wolf et al, among many other examples: https://www.loeb.com/en/insights/publications/2008/04/batra-v-wolf-et-al https://www.loeb.com/en/insights/publications/2008/04/batra-... > Plaintiff Ravi Batra, a bald, Indian-American lawyer involved in a judicial corruption scandal, filed a libel-in-fiction claim against the writers, producers and broadcasters of the television show Law & Order, claiming that an episode about a judicial bribery scandal that included a character who was a bald, Indian-American lawyer named Ravi Patel was defamatory. The court reached this holding after noting that no libel-in-fiction law suit in New York state court had survived a motion to dismiss in almost 25 years, and then denied defendants’ motion to dismiss. Actual malice is additionally only necessary if the victim is a public figure.
- 7y ago
- kapuasuite 7y agoSame thing with government trademarks being used in things like video games - there’s a reason why Call of Duty doesn’t use the real crests of the USMC, USN, SAS, etc. and why they went in and reskinned all of the NYPD and FDNY vehicles in the Division. Should never be a problem, and yet studios kowtow to public agencies in this regard all the time.