London 2012 Team GB Suit...again

[NE_OH_thonger]

Be careful about the rings. They're trademarked by the IOC (As is the word Olympics, BTW. In 1982, the US Olympic committee filed suit against a group led by Dr. Tom Waddell for organizing a "Gay Olympics." They were forced to change the name to the Gay Games.)

[sebbie]

I would work up a logo using 5 interlocked circles, but put the rings in the form of a circle rather than a horizontal line, so the logo alludes to the copyrighted Olympic rings, but is also clearly something different.

As a kid, I recall there was a popular brand name for a paper tablet, called "Penworthy". A competitor wanted to sell paper tablets too, so they called theirs "Writeworthy" which alluded to the better-known and no doubt copyrighted Penworthy but was clearly a different brand. Later on, the Penworthy tablets disappeared from the market, and the Writeworthy ones ended up with much of the market.

Ahh, the days when getting a tablet for school meant a tablet with paper and lines to write on.

The whole area of cooking up logos close to but not identical to copyrighted logos is an interesting one. If you cook up a logo different but a similar design, then the company owning the copyrighted logo has to bring a case claiming that consumers would somehow be "confused" into thinking your logo was their logo/product. This is not easy to do, and at minimum they would have to convince a judge that buyers would be confused and accidentally buy your product thinking it was theirs. Lawyers cost money, and the company needs to be convinced they will lose more money from your "accidental" sales than it would cost them to pay the legal costs to fight. THey MIGHT try writing you a letter saying they think their copyrighted logo is too close to your logo and to cease selling your product, but that might be it. Fighting a Chinese manufacturer using a similar logo where copyright laws are rarely enforced and the company is exporting directly to consumers not through US retailers presents new and more complicated hurdles, which is why we see all the Chinese made merchandise made to look as close as possible to the real branded product.

[area51tazz]

It would only be a limited run for those of us on here who are interested in one. I have to have at least 12 suits sold before I can start the process. I've already drawn up the design in Photoshop

I like the cut of SRSport's Infinity suits (same as my water polo suit for the team I'm on), so I'm considering using them. My template was done on the Turbo template if that gives you an idea to the cut.

[Minimalist75]

Originally Posted by NE_OH_thonger

Be careful about the rings. They're trademarked by the IOC (As is the word Olympics, BTW. In 1982, the US Olympic committee filed suit against a group led by Dr. Tom Waddell for organizing a "Gay Olympics." They were forced to change the name to the Gay Games.)

More extreme than that Olympics of the Mind a school age academic tournament, was forced to change their name to Oddessey of the Mind. Para Olympics and Special Olympics have permission to use the name, but it is difficult to get.