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RE: A dirty big secret of Blogging on Steem (and my solution to come clean)

in #blog7 years ago

All of the incidental imagery of copyrighted and trademarked logos is irrelevant.

  1. You are not re-broadcasting the Disney stuff.
  2. You are not producing new and unlicensed t-shirts, posters, or other merchandise
  3. This photo can be posted in its entirety or edited in any way that is reasonable

The "work" is a photograph of a scene in your home. That "work" is yours.

Now, you cannot take your photo and manipulate the Bulls poster in Photoshop and sell the Bulls image on a piece of merchandise.

You cannot crop the Disney stuff out and use it in a competitor product or service (like a Moose Club).

Other types of manipulation and derivative works are your fully within your rights. For example, you can really parody any or all of the logos... like place a copy of the guns-n-roses shirt and logo on Mini Mouse, or edit the Bulls logo to say "balls" or something. That is usually a fair use manipulation, and would likely be construed as parody rather than copyright infringement.

You probably know this intuitively, but as soon as you make a competing product or service, fair use is no longer fair. If you own a sports team, you cannot take the Bulls imagery and steal elements from it... that may include colors, fonts, graphic elements, or copying the name or likeness. If you own the "Ducks" and your logo is remarkably similar to and (obviously) derived from the "Bulls" ... you are going to find yourself in trademark court.

But with all of this commentary, if I had shown you an example of a "Ducks" logo that looks like "Bulls," having no intent to own or make a real "Ducks" team, would not be a copyright infringement. So the intent is super important. The Chicago Bulls would not have a prayer in court against a blogger or commentator who used their logo as part of a commentary on copyright infringement. There would be no harm, no foul... as they say. Such a commentary would be protected by fair use.

Next, as soon as a new "Ducks" team comes into existence 2 years from now, they cannot use my fake, exemplary one. I could have derived it from the poster, used it on a discussion, and then the new "Ducks" got ahold of it. They could call me up and pay me $1000 to use their image, or to obtain my copyright. But they cannot turn around and use it as their logo! It's a clear copyright infringement on the "Bulls" at this point. My "fair use" is the Ducks' copyright hell, even if they own the copyright to my image.

So, then, therefore... Your image is fine to post on Steem. (The key word in that sentence is in italics.)

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