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Todd Lehman wrote:
>
> In lugnet.publish, Kevin Loch writes:
> > In lugnet.publish, Barbara Sproat writes:
> > > [...] Or how about allowing custom minifigs from the member to be
> > > displayed? [...]
> >
> > [...] otherwise there will be a large selection of figs to choose from.
>
> Do you think this is safe (from a legal standpoint)? LEGO has already done
> this for members at the LEGO MINDSTORMS website.
>
> We had planned to do this for LUGNET members, but then LEGO went and put
> their own minifig generator to use:
>
> http://www.legomindstorms.com/members/index.asp?Userid=151
> http://www.legomindstorms.com/members/index.asp?Userid=154
> http://www.legomindstorms.com/members/index.asp?Userid=165
> http://www.legomindstorms.com/members/index.asp?Userid=168
> etc.
>
> The reason it made us nervous when they did that is because it seems likely
> (or at least possible) that people at TLC could assume that they had thought
> up the idea first -- and that if we did it afterwards, that we must've stolen
> [sic] the idea. But the idea of an interactive minifig generator was first
> demonstrated on the net way back in 1997:
>
> http://www.baseplate.com/toys/minifig/
>
> So we've hesitated to incorporate things of that nature. (Which isn't to
> suggest that they'll never ever go in.)
>
> Maybe we're just being overly cautious.
Lemme see if I get what you're saying. You guys thought of something
first, have clearly established prior art, and when TLC comes out with
the same idea, significantly after you do, you decide to not do it any
more because they might think you stole it from them?
Yes, you're being overly cautious.
IMHO.
--
Larry Pieniazek - lpieniazek@mercator.com - http://my.voyager.net/lar
http://www.mercator.com. Mercator, the e-business transformation company
fund Lugnet(tm): http://www.ebates.com/ ref: lar, 1/2 $$ to lugnet.
Note: this is a family forum!
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In lugnet.publish, Larry Pieniazek writes:
> Lemme see if I get what you're saying. You guys thought of something
> first, have clearly established prior art, and when TLC comes out with
> the same idea, significantly after you do, you decide to not do it any
> more because they might think you stole it from them?
No, sorry, I forgot the other related concerns... What's above is probably
only about 30-50% of it. One other thing was that it suddenly seemed a lot
less unique and special after TLC went and did it, and we had always kinda
wanted stuff on LUGNET to be special. On the other hand, no one I know ever
visits or hardly ever even mentions the official LEGO MINDSTORMS site (we all
know why), so it could still be special. Another concern is that Mini-Figure
imagery are trade dress and copyrights owned by LEGO, so it would really suck
to have it up and then be asked to take it down if they suddenly had a change
of heart. In 1997, we had met with TLC (then TLG) legal counsel to talk
about (among other things) the subtleties of displaying minifig torso art,
and although a photo of a minifig which just happens to be part of a scene is
one thing, a close-up scan or image-filling photo is quite a different thing.
The main concern they had with Suzanne's Minifig Generator at the time was
that it didn't acknowledge that LEGO owned the designs.
As far as establishing priority (in the legal sense of the word), we could
probably put a note or a link on key pages explaining that the idea was not
in fact ripped off from LEGO's site.
--Todd
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