Revell.com : Keep the public domain free from licensing restraints! — Apparently the corporations sucking the teat of the American taxpayer now wants to screw the model building children of America! This is incredible.
For more than fifty years, military aircraft, ships, and vehicle design and designations have been in the public domain and free from licensing restraints as the actual subjects were contracted and fully funded by the U.S. Government on behalf of the U.S. citizenry. Recently, major U.S. Defense contractors or their designated licensing agents have begun programs to appropriate these federally-assigned type designations (i.e. P-51, P-38, B-17, B-52), associated names (i.e. “Mustang”, “Lightning”, “Flying Fortress”, “Stratofortress”), and likenesses into intellectual property for corporate gain through royalty income from readily-recognized names and likenesses.
Contact your local Senator without delay to urge them to support House Bill 4806, Military Toy Replica Act. Passage of this Bill will “prohibit defense contractors from requiring licenses of fees for use of military likenesses or designation.”
found by Pat Larkin
I would just add a Lettering kit, for ANY NAME, I wish..
WHY?
Why worry if the defense contractors make a buck off of their products. Oh I see, they want us to waste our time and our representative’s time. Or, is it that they think ANYONE is freakin concerned about this non-issue except the manufacturers (Revell and others) that already rape people on the cost of their model kits? Have you seen the “quality” workmanship that goes into the model kits? I used to get so pissed off that the kits were so shitty to begin with, how was I supposed to make a decent model from that? John, I think I will leave you to worry and fret your little brain about this since it is so “incredible”. After all you know better than us about these large world-changing issues.
I think it’s great that you and the Revell Company have the time and energy to devote to this little campaign. I think you should take a group of your sympathizers and lobby for change without delay, because there is not enough beurocrasy in our government. And you’ll want to “Protect your access to your national military heritage!” and “Protect your access to scale replicas of military aircraft, vessels, and vehicles that have been funded by the U.S. Government with taxpayer dollars.”
I have a couple of wars, my family’s welfare, the price of fuel, and a few more “important’ things to think about right now.
So you go ahead and head this one up for us would you John?
Yes PcMonster…let’s forget about everything except the important stuff. How dare we worry about little things like this. All we should be talking about and worrying about and working to fix is the wars, family well being, price of fuel and the few more important things.
Have a hobby? Dump it, it’s not as important as the price of fuel. Do anything recreational, dump that also…we can’t afford to have people having fun out there when there are bad times around. Stop watching TV, stop reading novels, stop looking at art and listening to music. There are MUCH more important things out there in the world. All you should be concentrating on are the “important” things.
Stop! Drop! and Roll! PcMonster! You’re on fire, please put yourself out of our misery before your brain explodes with all that “important” thinking bouncing around inside your head.
Public Domain means just that, lets keep it that way.
well i was going to say that pcmonster had trouble looking at the details. But the last 2 people already did that. So i second #3 and #4.
It is not just plastic models, computer/console sims/games developers/publishers are being threatened by these companies’ lawyers. I might feel some sympathy if the (LMCO) engineers 🙂 received a sizable slice of the royalties, but honestly these companies are obsessed with driving up their stock price and look for revenue from any source.
Despite John’s inflamatory “spin” on his initial post, and PCMonster’s rather awkward reply, there are a few shadowy questons bubbling unseen below the surface. Things like: Did the vendor’s contract address image and/or likeness copyrights? Gulfstream recently lost a court case when they sued a third party maintenance provider for copying portions of their maintenance manuals. Are there security aspects of the design that shouldn’t be incorporated into model kits?
Sounds to me like Revell is attempting a legislative end around before the court battles begin, kind of like Harley-Davidson did a few years ago when the rice-rockets starting eating away at their market share.
The last plastic model I built (some years ago) depicted the schooner Cutty Sark under full sail, in memorial to the scotch I drank. She looked awesome, until the damned cat clawed his way through the rigging. I didn’t kill the cat, but I did drop him close to a dumpster behind a busy restaurant, where I suppose he ate his fill, as he never found his way home. The lady of the house pined for a while over her “runaway cat”, but she eventually got over it. Then she left, and life became simple and wonderful once again.
For gawd sake don’t let Ross Perot find out about this!
#7….Omar….I know damn well there’s a Hollywood blockbuster in that last paragraph.
Uhm. I think there is a question that has not been raised here. Military aircraft IP goes far beyond models. What of video games ?
7 Are there security aspects of the design that shouldn’t be incorporated into model kits?
My first thought: Seriously..??
My second thought: Didn’t the model companies go through this when the first F-117 models were released? The concerns about showing too much detail about the stealth design and/or putting disclaimers on the model design being an “artist’s concept” so they wouldn’t have to explain how they got access to the looks/design of a top secret plane…
The point I think a lot of folks are missing here is that if this is allowed it’s only a matter of time before this case might be cited as an instance where an individual/corporation/organization can lay claim, trademark and/or copyright to something in the public domain. The potential repercussions run deeper than you think.
The video game industry has already been affected as Maddox Games, creators of the IL2 Sturmovik series of combat flight sims were sued by an aerospace corporation over the use of intellectual property (the names and likenesses of aircraft they haven’t manufactured in 6 decades.)
This is not just a hobby company trying to save “their a**ses” as it’s not a stretch of the imagination for this to spread out into historical works, text books, movies. At that point our access to military history would indeed be in jeopardy.
In my opinion these aircraft were paid for with the U.S. Taxpayer’s dollars and the designations, which were given to them by the U.S. Military, would fall under the same public domain law as any non-Classified document or photo created by the U.S. Government.
That’s right. The model manufacturers are fighting for their customers, not just themselves. The AMA (Academy of Model Aeronautics) has gotten into the fray also. Any costs due to licensing these replicas are passed on to the consumer, after all. It’s the hobbiest who pays twice – once to help the manufacturer develop the military vehicle/weapons system through tax dollars, and again to pay the royalty fees when buying a replica.