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Warner Bros Is Cracking Down On Harry Potter Festivals (apnews.com)

Posted by msmash on from the somethings-never-change dept.

Warner Bros is cracking down on local Harry Potter fan festivals around the country, saying it's necessary to halt unauthorized commercial activity. From a report: Fans, however, liken the move to Dementors sucking the joy out of homegrown fun, while festival directors say they'll transfigure the events into generic celebrations of magic. "It's almost as if Warner Bros. has been taken over by Voldemort, trying to use dark magic to destroy the light of a little town," said Sarah Jo Tucker, a 21-year-old junior at Chestnut Hill College, which hosts a Quidditch tournament that coincides with the annual suburban Philadelphia festival. Philip Dawson, Chestnut Hill's business district director, said Warner Bros. reached out to his group in May, letting them know new guidelines prohibit festivals' use of any names, places or objects from the series. That ruled out everything from meet-and-greet with Dumbledore and Harry to Defense Against the Dark Arts classes. Related story, from 18 years ago: Harry Potter Sites vs. Warner Brothers.

14 of 160 comments (clear)

  1. Great business decision.... by b0s0z0ku · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Turn down free marketing/free publicity for your movies. Also, the books came first -- is the book publisher also harassing festival organizers?

    1. Re: Great business decision.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      What is so wrong with using your imagination as an adult? It's like everyone forgets the joy of being a kid and pretending. Yea life comes at ya and pushes that to the side, but we should still make time to pretend and imagine things that don't exist. Whether that means writing a book, playing d&d, or even role playing in and outside of a video game universe.

      Lighten up, sometimes I wish I was a kid again, the pure bliss and my imagination, Jr was all I needed at times. Now everything drains my time and life fucking sucks. So fuck off and stop bashing us who want to escape for a couple hours a week into our imaginations. We have that right.

    2. Re:Great business decision.... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Nomative use is not considered to dilute a trademark.

      Except that is not what is happening. These "fan festivals" charge fees, sell merchandise, are promoted with paid advertising, and are clearly commercial activities.

      It is disingenuous to spin this as WB cracking down on kids playing in their backyard.

    3. Re:Great business decision.... by lgw · · Score: 3, Interesting

      You missed his point: you don't dilute a trademark by using it for the trademarked product. Calling Kleenex "Kleenex" does not in any way dilute that trademark, authorized or not, and requires no defense. Calling Puffs "Kleenex" is what you need to sue over.

      But it's irreverent anyhow, this is all copyright-related.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    4. Re:Great business decision.... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You missed his point: you don't dilute a trademark by using it for the trademarked product.

      You missed the point: The trademark is being used for OTHER PRODUCTS. Specifically, a commercial festival that is not endorsed or affiliated with the owner of the trademark.

    5. Re:Great business decision.... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Interesting

      They could also "defend" it by offering an inexpensive licensing deal for small festivals.

      Disney does this for school plays. For a small fee you get scripts, rent-a-costumes, and plans for props for "Show White", "Cinderella", "Beauty and the Beast", etc.

      Disclaimer: Yes, I am aware that these stories are centuries old, and Disney does not actually own them. But they do own trademarks for many of the characters, and people are far more familiar with the Disneyfied version of these stories than the originals, which tend to be darker and more violent.

    6. Re:Great business decision.... by The+Rizz · · Score: 5, Informative

      Because trademark law offers no "fair use" provisions, which means that a company has to aggressively hunt down anybody who uses their trademarked characters or risk losing the trademarks altogether.

      Absolutely false, and people need to stop repeating this crap. First off, US law definitely has "fair use" protections on trademark usage, such as those related to 1st Amendment protections. Secondly, you cannot ever lose a trademark just because someone else uses it and you don't sue them. To be blunt, there are only two ways to lose a trademark: (1) Non-use; and (2) dilution (i.e. becoming generic).

      Someone else using your mark without permission theoretically could be considered contributory evidence that you've abandoned your mark, but that's also going to require a lot more evidence (basically, extensive non-use, typically meaning your company doesn't do anything with the mark for 5+ years).

      The other risk (dilution/becoming generic) is not a concern for something like "Harry Potter" - this applies to a term becoming used to describe everything in a category. Examples include Kleenex being used to describe all facial tissues, or Google being used as a verb to describe all web searches ("why don't you just google it?").

      As for protecting their rights, it is not necessary for a trademark owner to take enforcement action against all infringement if it can be shown that the owner perceived the infringement to be minor and inconsequential. This is why it's actually suggested that trademark holders ignore small uses - because not only is it not worth paying a lawyer to send a C&D, nor the bad publicity, but that it sets a precedent that you are aware of their existence and considered events of that size to be of consequence (i.e. fighting small festivals makes you more likely to lose your trademark).

      If they allow a festival of a certain size to use their trademarks, the another slightly bigger one will want to do the same, then a bigger one, and I think you are smart enough to know where this is going.

      That more and more people are going to be buying Harry Potter merchandise, and getting more and more of a fan fervor worked up for their upcoming series of movies? Oh dear, how horrible for them!

      This actually beings up one of the other fair use provisions that trademarks are bound by: positive identification usage. You cannot use trademark to sue someone for using your trademark to correctly identify your product. It's the same reason why McDonald's can use Burger King's trademark in commercials where they compare their burgers to the other company's. It's the same reason stores can advertise what they're selling without having to get permission from the manufacturers. So, if you want to advertise a "Harry Potter Festival" there is no legal standing to sue you if you are indeed having a festival centered around official Harry Potter products.

    7. Re:Great business decision.... by Bender0x7D1 · · Score: 3, Informative

      It was in Dragon Magazine, Issue #84. The comic was "What's New with Phil & Dixie!"

      You can find a PDF of the issue at: https://annarchive.com/files/D...

      --
      Reading code is like reading the dictionary - you have to read half of it before you can go back and understand it.
  2. Two words: normative use by mark-t · · Score: 3, Informative

    Google the term if you don't know what is. All they need to do is both assert normative usage rights and to expressly indicate that they are not endorsed by or affiliated with the owners of the Harry Potter franchise, including but not limited to J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers.

    --
    File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
  3. Paramount tried the same thing... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I remember being a Trekkie in the 80s and how draconian Paramount could be. Even threatening club newsletters, calling them "Fanzines" and accusing them of infringing on their copyrights. Every convention had to be licensed or really, really small with no commercial activity. The wonderful Filk songs on VHS with new music set to cuts of episodes were very creative but on the shit list of some lawyers. The bootleg bloopers were probably going too far... but hey, good times!

    Wonder if the Tolkien estate harasses hobbits? GRRM might knight you if you have pizza with him, but I heard HBO has no such sense of humor, so watch out Brotherhood Without Banners!

  4. Re:Two words: normative use by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 3, Informative

    All they need to do is both assert normative usage rights and to expressly indicate that they are not endorsed by or affiliated with the owners of the Harry Potter franchise, including but not limited to J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers.

    Ask the Prelude to Axenar folks how well that “Nomative Use” argument worked for them.

    --
    #DeleteChrome
  5. Re:next thing you know by Isaac-Lew · · Score: 5, Informative

    This recent article indicates the opposite: Kraft Heinz (owners of the Country Time Lemonade brand) set up a fund to help pay for lemonade stands fees & fines: https://qz.com/1300935/country...

  6. Stupidest Company ever by DougReed · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Warner Brother has proven time and again, that they are completely stupid and greedy.

    o Let's merge with a DialUp company after the Internet has made them irrelevant.
    o Let's close all of the Warner Brothers Stores in the malls because they don't earn a profit. YOU DON"T CARE IF THEY EARN A PROFIT! YOU ARE SELLING YOUR ADVERTISING!!! Mickey Mouse is still popular, but no kid ever heard of Bugs Bunny! Because Disney is still selling Mickey Mouse stuff to new kids, and WB killed the goose that laid the golden egg.

    Why should this be any different? Instead of encouraging people to spread the popularity of their stuff, they shut it down, and slowly kill it. Years from now Star Wars will still matter because Disney gets this, and Harry Potter will be forgotten because Warner Brothers will have strangled it to death.

    They even tried to extort money from people for singing happy birthday! Their own greed ultimately cost them $14 million dollars... the amount, by the way they thought they could extort from people by claiming to own it in first first place.

  7. Re:next thing you know by turp182 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Country Time Lemonade is actually helping kids with stand related legal issues...

    https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/11...

    Awesome photo!

    --
    BlameBillCosby.com