# Could GW be guilty of IP theft



## Achaylus72 (Apr 30, 2011)

Yesterday i was going through my box of decals to see what i could use on my Chaos Space Marines.

Well i picked up my Cadian Transfer Sheet and read what was on the Decal Sheet and low and behold i spotted something interesting, GW has taken the names of two of the biggest Heavy Metal bands and used them on the Cadian Transfer Sheet.

On the Cadian Transfer Sheet it clearly reads Sepulchra Metallica.

Surely any metal head out there would see the stylised version of Sepultura and outright lifting of Metallica's name.

I just wonder has GW have any license agreements with both Sepultura and Metallica to use their brands.

It would be interesting to see how this would be seen on a legal basis, considering how protective Metallica is with their brand and IP.


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## yoyoyo12365 (Dec 6, 2010)

Good sir, Sepulchra Metallica is, in no way, an infringement on somebody's Intellectual Property. You see, because the words exist in a language, and have a meaning to them (no expert here, but my guess would be"metal coffin"), their being used here is simply the use of words.
It's like if you bought a new appliance, and at the back it had a sticker that said AC/DC. The sticker is not an IP infringement, because they are in no way referring to the band, but instead to alternating and direct electrical currents.
Did that make any sense? I just woke up, so...


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## Orochi (Jan 28, 2009)

Following this logic, every time we wrote down 'Guns' or 'Roses' we'd owe someone some money.

Unless I'm very much mistaken, it's impossible to 'own' the rights to a word unless you invent/coin it.


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## BloodAngelZeros (Jul 1, 2008)

Actually it's just latin for Grave Metal


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## yoyoyo12365 (Dec 6, 2010)

meh, close enough.


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

Metallica owns this: 










They do not own the word itself, as the other have already told you.


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## tu_shan82 (Mar 7, 2008)

Seeing as this isn't news or a rumor, I'm going to shift it to General 40K.


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## Pssyche (Mar 21, 2009)

But the best is, we all know that Games Workshop knows its demographic and that they purposely chose those two words for EXACTLY the reason that many modellers will associate them with two of their favourite bands...


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## Nave Senrag (Jul 8, 2010)

Well, Bethesda (technically Zenimax) is suing Notch because he named his game "Scrolls", which they feel violates there copyright of "The Elder Scrolls", and it is in the process of going to court, so I suppose there is a lot of ambiguity when it comes to copyright law.


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## Son of mortarion (Apr 24, 2008)

Nave Senrag said:


> Well, Bethesda (technically Zenimax) is suing Notch because he named his game "Scrolls", which they feel violates there copyright of "The Elder Scrolls", and it is in the process of going to court, so I suppose there is a lot of ambiguity when it comes to copyright law.


Where is the ambiguity? Both are games, and there is a similarity in names. Bethesda simply has to prove that the names are not dissimilar enough, and or that the intent was to mislead/misrepresent the product by creating an association, and they will have a reasonably strong case.


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## VK-Duelist (Oct 4, 2010)

The developers settled it all out with a game of Unreal.

Don't know who won.

But if I remember, both developers were okay with it, but Betheseda's lawyers won't and was being greedy little piggies.


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

IP law is fun 

If I want to run an event that will explore the creation of games and game mechanics, then I can call it a Games Workshop and there is nothing that GW can do about it.


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## Achaylus72 (Apr 30, 2011)

What my purpose of this was to at least show that GW can when it suits them take from others.

It does not matter what GW meant by using Sepulchra Metallica on it's transfer sheet, the problem is that it could have used anything else, but used a well known and established brandname and trade mark of one and possibly two of the best known Heavy Metal bands in the World.

GW can't claim ignorance in this, because i have visited at least 6 GW stores in my local area and every one of them plays heavy metal in their stores.

Just saying that's all.


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## Pssyche (Mar 21, 2009)

Well, I know I've pointed this out on Heresy On-Line previously, but this is one of the worst bits of plagiarism that I have ever seen.

The Morlocks from the 1953 George Pal film "The Time Machine" and the Dark Eldar Mandrakes from almost sixty years later.

As for the fluff?

One of them skulks about in the dark and shadows, inflicting pain with their bare teeth and nails before devouring the flesh of those killed.

The other is a Mandrake...


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## the-ad-man (Jan 22, 2010)

i'd say the mandrakes are different enough, they use weapons, are onyx black, on fire and wearing the bottom half of a kimono.

the only similarities are the fluff/nature of the creatures(but that in the whole isn't terribly unique anyway, what self respecting fantasy setting DOESN'T have a creature that does this?) and only similarity in appearance is the white hair.


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## chromedog (Oct 31, 2007)

Technically they are wearing hakama.

Which is not part of a kimono, but a kimono is _part_ of the outfit, along with kataginu.


A mate used to do Kendo and the hakama were part of his gear.


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## TheSpore (Oct 15, 2009)

GW has come close IMO to IP violation, the thing is they tend to make very and I meanvery subtle changes, but one can easily see where the general inspiration came from, example look at 3rd ed nids hive tyrant and the current warriors, they look very much like the aliens from well Aliens, except nids have eyes


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

TheSpore said:


> GW has come close IMO to IP violation, the thing is they tend to make very and I meanvery subtle changes, but one can easily see where the general inspiration came from, example look at 3rd ed nids hive tyrant and the current warriors, they look very much like the aliens from well Aliens, except nids have eyes


"looks like" and "inspired by" dont constitute IP violation, IF GW had created a game called Aliens and filled it with models looking like the ones from the movie and some colonial marine models ,then Fox would have dragged them over the coals.
Most things in Art are inspired by and reworked and rehashed to produce a new work or upto date work, even going back to ancient civilisations,look at the pyramids, some dude said "wow, i like that !build me one but make it bigger/better/more elaborate than his"
which is why these days companies protect there works, which is why chapterhouse finds itself in court and GW hasnt (so far).
Anyone can copy anything and sell it, its how you go about it that matters


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## SilverTabby (Jul 31, 2009)

TheSpore said:


> GW has come close IMO to IP violation, the thing is they tend to make very and I meanvery subtle changes, but one can easily see where the general inspiration came from, example look at 3rd ed nids hive tyrant and the current warriors, they look very much like the aliens from well Aliens, except nids have eyes


They really don't. The old metal hormogaunts are the ones that look like Aliens... :wink:

http://www.solegends.com/citcat1998/1998P405-02.htm


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## Pssyche (Mar 21, 2009)

That black skin looks pretty green from where I'm standing.
So they stick a sword in its hand and a different style "skirt" that changes its appearance enough to be completely unrecognizable to the "inspiration". What if the clothing was painted reddish-brown?
You know it's a rip-off.


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## Baltar (Aug 16, 2008)

Clearly some strong misunderstanding of how IP works going on here...


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## Champion Alaric (Feb 17, 2011)

Yah IP is quite a deal. I member a few years ago when SPIKE tv came out and Spike Jones sued them. He lost and I laughed at his arrogance for thinking he owned the word Spike.

B&K has it right on, you can copy but its how you go about selling it that matters.


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## aranelthemithra (Nov 1, 2011)

Drawing inspiration is not the same thing as stealing intellectual property. 

Lets look for a decent example... looking... looking. Oh... yeah, Warhammer Fantasy! 

How many people think the elves have a serious similarity to those found in book written by J.R.R. Tolkien? Dwarves were not visualized the way that GW uses them until Tolkien described them as such (mining, drinking, heavily bearded, etc) 

To deny that Tyranids aren't HEAVILY inspired by the xenomorphs from Aliens is simply not paying attention. 

Inspiration is, and always will be, the acceptance that there is nothing new under the sun. 

Intellectual property is a much narrower world to deal with, and trademarks and copyrights are an adjunct to that branch of law - but are not the same. 

Metallica owns a trademark for that name. There is no intellectual property associated to that name, just a brand (trademark) - though songs, lyrics, etc... whole different story. No other band can use the name, and nothing associated to music would be able to utilize the name either. A paint, however (assuming they used a unique, differentiated logo) could call itself Metallica paints, and sell a line of only metallic paints and the band would be out of luck. 

There is recent case law associated to this regarding two multinational companies. Apple, and Apple Records (The beatles label). 

Apple Records and Apple Computers lived happily together for decades - the logos were undeniably similar - the companies shared a name. Certainly that would be trademark infringement by Apple computers! 

Not so. Apple Records owned a trademark within their market vertical. Music. 

Apple Computers owned a trademark in their market vertical... technology. 

Then Apple Computers made a misjudgment - they started iTunes. Now they were Apple and they were selling music! Lawsuits ensued, and Apple Music owned all the tiebreakers. 

Games Workshop invented the "idea" of Thunderwolf Cavalry. They didn't however, produce those ideas as 3-dimensional models. 

Therefore, a model of a thunderwolf cavalry is in breach of intellectual property. Even though the item itself has never been produced, the idea (the intellectual property, if you will) belongs squarely with GW. Unfortunately for GW, people riding wolves is not a unique idea. Science-fiction soldiers, wearing powered armour riding massive Thunderwolves is. So other companies said... "cool, we don't need to call them thunderwolves - heck, it would be impossible to claim a problem with cyber wolf since neither word is protected."

They don't put the science-fiction soldier on the cyber wolf, they just put some legs on it. Why aren't the legs a problem? Have you looked at medieval armour? Sure, it's plainly not a knight, but you can't claim interlocking leg armour as some protected idea. 

BUT... it gets interesting now. A generic cyber wolf with a rider has now become (in physical 3-d form) an idea. So a company now owns the idea of building a model which represents a massive wolf being ridden by ... something. GW made Canis, but Canis isn't a generic unit, he's a special character. 

So, can Games Workshop even make their own Thunderwolf Cavalry models anymore without stealing someone ELSE's intellectual property? 

In short, which this is not... 

Sepulchra Metallica would, at most, be a trademark infringement (x2) if it wandered in the world of music. As it is, it's not even in the same ball park... so no issues there. 

The Mandrake vs "The Time Machine" movie monsters. Passing similarities without additional specific stealing ideas are simply that. They look similar. Problem? Games Workshop miniatures are made as gray models. They don't have colours. Now, the painter may be guilty of plagiarism, but Games Workshop is free and clear - even if there were enough to imply some issue with IP. 

As far as the TWC. Games Workshop has no intention of making the models. Therefore, I assume they are dodging any potential fight since the demand for the models is high.


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