Talk is cheap. Lawyers are not. Where can I donate some money to take these clowns down?
HBO slaps takedown demand on 13-year-old girl's painting because it used 'Winter is coming'
It turns out King Joffrey isn't the biggest scumbag at HBO after all. A father says lawyers at the cable TV network demanded his 13-year-old daughter's artwork be taken off the internet after she drew a lovely picture titled "winter is coming" and posted the image to arts'n'craft website RedBubble. "My daughter, who happens …
COMMENTS
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Friday 9th December 2016 13:31 GMT PLAzmA
How can they trademark the phrase when there are so many examples of prior art in the public domain of the use of this phrase going back long long before HBO's show. Do a google image search for the phrase and you will see its used in lots of memes and similar images to the one produced by this poor child.... I dont understand who's arse got bend out of shape by the picture for this to even ever happen.... Oh wait....
Could this be a publicity stunt to keep the stupid show in peoples mind and in a few days/weeks they will issue a public apology and invite the kid onset for a photo opportunity and to make amends..... watch this space.
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Friday 9th December 2016 17:09 GMT Haku
Re: I'll just leave this here and sit back.
Hahahahaha! Brilliant.
Here's a clickable link of it so people don't have to copy/paste:
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Friday 9th December 2016 16:04 GMT macspite
Set up a fighting fund for countering idiotic trsademark protection? Just do it
Ask for donations, however small. Every little helps
This is only a suggestion, feel free to Nave it your way
Thanks to the Register this comment is connecting people, because you're worth it,
As for me, trademarking? I'm lovin' it - making America great again
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Friday 9th December 2016 16:17 GMT Paul Hovnanian
Fair Use
Using that phrase within the artwork might be protected by the 'fair use' doctrine. It's possible that HBO objected to the use of that phrase as the file name when it was uploaded. It would then appear in a search along with their branded merchandise. So, change the name and put it back up.
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Friday 9th December 2016 17:19 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Fair Use already Streisanded
" It's possible that HBO objected to the use of that phrase as the file name when it was uploaded. It would then appear in a search along with their branded merchandise. "
Did you actually try putting that into Google before coming out with that attempt at pro-HBO PR?
They are totally Streisanded at the moment, the front page is full of this story whereas if they had done the obvious thing - i.e. nothing whatsoever - an obscure file wouldn't make it onto any search page anyone is likely to look at. Because Google has clever algorithms called "Page Rank" to ensure that's exactly what happens. If I put a file called Winter is Coming and a picture of the various tits on my bird table (as distinct from the various tits that work for HBO IP department) it won't make it onto page 300, let alone the first page.
As it is, Kasparov's book of the same name is on about page 2. I await with interest what HBO does about that.
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Friday 9th December 2016 16:21 GMT keith_w
I think that PAUL CLAYTON, LARRY EHRLICH, DAVID LAZAR, TOM SIX
should sue HBO and GRRM for stealing ther phrase:
Done laid around, done stayed around this old town too long
Summer's almost gone, winter's coming on
Done laid around, done stayed around this old town too long
And it seems like I've got to travel on
And it seems like I've got to travel on
Gotta Travel On
Performed by lots of people including Bob :Dylan, Neil Young, Billy Grammar and a host of others
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Friday 9th December 2016 17:05 GMT Uffish
Prior use ?
Ezra Pound (Lustra, 1916):
Winter is icumen in,
Lhude sing Goddamm,
Raineth drop and staineth slop,
And how the wind doth ramm!
Sing: Goddamm.
Skiddeth bus and sloppeth us,
An ague hath my ham.
Freezeth river, turneth liver,
Damm you; Sing: Goddamm.
Goddamm, Goddamm, 'tis why I am, Goddamm,
So 'gainst the winter's balm.
Sing goddamm, damm, sing goddamm,
Sing goddamm, sing goddamm, DAMM.
(a parody of the the 13th century song "Sumer Is Icumen In").
And all sing "Goddamm, DAMM the fartwits at HBO".
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Friday 9th December 2016 17:23 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Prior use ? - Ezra Pound
Ezra Pound wrote an immensely long poem attacking capitalism and arguing that culture was universal and couldn't be appropriated by commercial interests.
"with usura [i.e. rent seeking, which is basically what HBO is doing]
...
no picture is made to endure nor to live with
but it is made to sell and sell quickly"
He may have been a nutcase of paranoid tendencies who thought Mussolini was a great thinker, but he had a point.
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Friday 9th December 2016 17:17 GMT ProfessorLarry
Trademarked speech
The idiocy of allowing the trademarking of common, widely used phrases was mapped out and lampooned in my 1995 column "Registered Peopleware," reprinted in _The Peopleware Papers_ (Prentice Hall, 2001). The bulk of the story is constructed almost entirely from trademarked words and phrases, such as "We've thought of everything", "The Best Solution", and "Bad Idea." Pity the poor meteorologist or climate scientist who now can no longer say "winter is coming." [Disclaimer: All trademarks and service marks are the property of their respective owners.]
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Friday 9th December 2016 18:57 GMT NANOTECH
CUT CABLE DUMP DISH
Whenever I see the abuse of trademarks in this way, I cringe having had to fight similar suits and threats over the years. Beat microsoft years ago, and now am fighting dish as they claim they own trademark dish, when in fact, they don't, the registered dish network. This has gone on for over a year where I keep getting threatened and bullied by dish network. I offered to sell them my url, even lease it to them if they are so concerned. After all, it will cost them more to sue than what I am asking, a measly $5K, so makes you wonder what motivates companies like HBO in this case whereby an innocent autistic childs art work would be attacked over such a generic phrase that probably no one even knew about until now.
Protest with your pocketbooks and wallets, drop HBO from your TV cable or dish subscription, in fact, a move to put these monopolies out of business is well under way with new media centers, or as we use to call them, the black box which allows you to watch what you want when you want, no more rip off costs for PPV rentals, so I hit them in their bottom line and no longer pay subscription fees saving thousands to date. Nothing better than FREE-PPV.com so see how much you can save and fight back against these bully monopolies who have ripped us off for decades. Stream your way to savings. Best way to beat these bullies is to post all over the place winter is coming and let them attack everyone.
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Friday 9th December 2016 19:36 GMT David 4
This should never have been trademarked as it is an English phrase that has been used extensively thoughout the world since the 'Winter' season was named.
The people who are responsible for trademarks are just morons shoud not be allowed to trademark terms that are in general use, or that are part of the standard English language.
Copy and share the image with the girls name/story across the world.
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Friday 9th December 2016 21:03 GMT Anonymous Coward
Winter is coming
Hey, it was only last month that I thought Winter is Coming. And then I thought, ah, it's December so it has come, if I work for the Met Office. Then I thought, ah, Winter is Coming, but it has not yet come. When I think that Winter is Coming I think of snow and ice and all things nice. Although Winter is Coming, it has not yet come. But Winter is Coming. It is, honestly. Winter is Coming.
On the 21st it will be a different thing. But until then, Winter is Coming. Then again, after the 21st, even though it will have come, it will be less than 12 months before Winter is Coming happens again. indeed, Winter is Coming happens every year.
Winter is Coming is not my favourite time of year. But Winter is Coming means Christmas is Coming (TM).[1] So Winter is Coming also means nice thoughts about Christmas.
Winter is Coming, and the goose is getting fat. Yum, yum. Winter is Coming, nice.
Twats. (Anonymous, obviously.)
[]1 You are not allowed to steal this, you cunts.
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Monday 12th December 2016 16:11 GMT Robert Baker
List please?
Someone should publish a complete list of all shows by the Heartless Bastards Organisation, so that we can all boycott them. Let them see how much their "trademarks" are worth if they're rendered worthless by the fact that their shows no longer have any viewers.
In the meantime, they can shove their "trademarks" where the sun don't shine, closely followed by at least one lighted stick of dynamite.
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Monday 12th December 2016 23:22 GMT Anonymous Coward
Winter is HERE
https://static1.e621.net/data/e3/b6/e3b672270dbf40806e7f59b273f931c0.jpg
from left to right: Puzzle, an Anglo-Indian giraffe (very long story) and Diamond, a zebra who thinks that black is a drab colour and needs to be brightened up a little, and Nightshade, an Egyptian jackal who has no sense of humor at all, and, unlike Diamond, thinks that black is her colour. Diamond and Nightshade are NOT friends. Diamond has just hit Nightshade with a very large snowball.
The takedown notice for this one ought to be interesting.
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