Originally Posted By Rebekah This topic is for discussion of the 7/15/2002 news item <b><a href="http://www.sundayherald.com/26246" target="_blank">SundayHerald: Hospital steps in to thwart Disney threat</a></b> According to a report in the <I>Sunday Herald</I>, the Disney company had ordered the owner of Tinkerbell children's clothes shop to change the name of her 15 year store. The Great Ormond Street Hospital stepped in saying Disney did not own the name Tinkerbell they did and allowed her to license the name for a donation of 500 pounds.
Originally Posted By Darkbeer Good for the Hospital, glad to see some common sence step in and allow the shop to keep its name, and glad to see Disney lawyers get a "what are you doing", they don't own the trademark to Tinkerbell, so why did they take the action in the first place, they should have known that the hospital owned the rights, and the second letter addressed that...
Originally Posted By uruseiranma You have to wonder: did these executives try and step forward and slap Spielberg and Amblin Entertainment when they were doing "Hook" back in 1991? i think everyone will agree that studio executives (Disney and non-Disney) are collective pains. Studio execs wanted to not release anymore Miyazaki films in the US, and thy also want to give us more DTV sequels.
Originally Posted By CuriosWolfSo I agree that sometimes the Disney lawyers go overboard on the Disney characters and their names. I remember on one episode of "The Simpsons" One Simpson character gave the Disney lawyers a good beating up since they were trying to sue him for using the phrase "The Happiest Place on Earth" for the School Fair. I think it was Principal Skinner.
Originally Posted By arstogas Bravo for the Hospital. A little beacon of ordinary kindness outshines the legal "magic" of Disney's attack dogs.
Originally Posted By Darkbeer This weekend, while listening to the news on the radio, some car dealership called themselves "The Second Happiest Place on Earth"....
Originally Posted By AniMazed It's very tough to protect copyrights if it can be proven that no steps were taken to ensure compliance (THAT'S an opening sentence!) The reason Disney takes legal action is that if they don't, a case could be made to prove that they did not exercise protection and tehrefor allowed the copyright to become part of the public domain.
Originally Posted By Darkbeer But why did the Disney lawyers take legal action against the store, the store was NOT using the Disney "image" of Tinkerbell, just the name Tinkerbell, which Disney does not own (Disney actually paid the copyright owners (Great Ormond Street Hospital, which received them from the author of Peter Pan, JM Barrie) for the rights to use Tinkerbell (and the rest of the Peter Pan story). So this looks like someone in Disney Legal didn't know what Disney owns and doesn't own... wonder if this will be used in the Pooh Lawsuit??????
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>This weekend, while listening to the news on the radio, some car dealership called themselves "The Second Happiest Place on Earth"....<< If a car dealerhip is the Second Happiest Place on Earth, the curve from #1 to #2 is awfully, awfully steep!
Originally Posted By JeffG >> "So this looks like someone in Disney Legal didn't know what Disney owns and doesn't own... wonder if this will be used in the Pooh Lawsuit??????" << What possible relevance could this have to that suit? -Jeff
