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Legal Conversation (Split from T-Shirt Thread)

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that form is saying something about taxing our product. I don't think it's taxable because all proceeds are going to be donated. I could be wrong about this but it is definitely something we need to get all of the facts about before proceeding.

Here is the vendors license form... it is free to obtain
 
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Okay BuckeyePlanet lawyers... this post is for you.

I have been in contact with the assistant director over at the Trademark and Licensing Dept. at Ohio State for the past few days and here is what I have gathered from him.
- The university will do what ever is necessary to stop the production of the shirts on the basis of trademark infringement. How could we be infringing on their trademark when A)we are not using the Ohio State Logo and B) we are not using the words "Ohio State"?
- I also asked about getting the shirts officially licensed from the university and the response I received was "we are currently over licensed in the t-shirt department". How is that detrimental to the university?
- Lastly, what are the consequences if we proceed to have the shirts made and distribute them to our members for a donation to the site? Are there any other ways around this or is this guy just being a ****?

Thanks for any help you can give.
 
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No where near being a lawyer but there are dozens of people all over campus selling t shirts that are much more "infringing" than these every home game. (I know, I have a lot of them.) I would think that the name Buckeye Planet belongs to Clarity, not OSU, buuuuuuut, like I said, I am no lawyer.

ScarletInMyVeins said:
Okay BuckeyePlanet lawyers... this post is for you.

I have been in contact with the assistant director over at the Trademark and Licensing Dept. at Ohio State for the past few days and here is what I have gathered from him.
- The university will do what ever is necessary to stop the production of the shirts on the basis of trademark infringement. How could we be infringing on their trademark when A)we are not using the Ohio State Logo and B) we are not using the words "Ohio State"?
- I also asked about getting the shirts officially licensed from the university and the response I received was "we are currently over licensed in the t-shirt department". How is that detrimental to the university?
- Lastly, what are the consequences if we proceed to have the shirts made and distribute them to our members for a donation to the site? Are there any other ways around this or is this guy just being a ****?

Thanks for any help you can give.
 
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gost8 said:
No where near being a lawyer but there are dozens of people all over campus selling t shirts that are much more "infringing" than these every home game. (I know, I have a lot of them.) I would think that the name Buckeye Planet belongs to Clarity, not OSU, buuuuuuut, like I said, I am no lawyer.
I thought the same thing.. evidently the colors scarlet and grey belong to Ohio State. I guess we'll have to use red and silver :wink:
 
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ScarletInMyVeins said:
I thought the same thing.. evidently the colors scarlet and grey belong to Ohio State. I guess we'll have to use red and silver :wink:
WTF??? So every t-shirt made that is red or gray is subject to scrutiny by this guy? I think he probably has to say that to everyone that calls about t-shirts.
 
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Scarlet spoke with him, not me, but I'm pretty sure we're just getting ignored cuz we're the little guy here. Let me quote his generic mailing sent to Scarlet here for reference purposes:
Mr. Lucas:

As mentioned in our phone conversation, we believe these shirts trade off ofthe goodwill of Ohio State and would take all necessary measures to stop the production, distribution and sale of them.

Rob Cleveland

- Our logo is hardly infringing on their copyrighted stuff. Maybe, just maybe, you could get a court to rule that we're benefiting from the scarlet and grey of tOSU, but we've gone pretty far out of our way to avoid stealing like most t-shirt vendors do.

- His answer that they would release the hounds on us sounds like a generic response. If he were actually considering the merits of our request, he would realize that this is not your standard run-of-the-mill tOSU mockup t-shirt, but rather one that barely involves tOSU "trademarks"... if at all. We're not even using "buckeye nation" which is the only similar phrase I would think they could claim ownership of (and even that seems shaky)

Our follow up request after the above mailing was to try and work out a licensing agreement (involving paying them part of the profit, etc.) and his reply was: "we're overlicensed in t-shirts right now."

- First of all, the chances of them not taking up nike or another big name company because they are over licensed is about .001%. They're disregarding us because we're a little guy here. If you think about it, even if they were worried about being overlicensed, this is hardly a t-shirt that is going to produce a lot of volume.

We're working on this guys... but please if there are lawyers reading this or anyone with some knowledge of the legal system, please help us out, cuz we're getting disrespected here.
 
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The Buckeye Nation T-Shirt people got shut down, but they were a commercial entity that existed for the sole purpose of making money off of the shirts. I haven't been to the website lately ( There was a message about licensing rights, but I think the site is totally gone now), but it used to be one of BN's advertising banners.

For reference it said:

BUCKEYE NATION
( member since 1999 )

Where the year was any year you wanted and it was enclosed in a pill-shaped circle.

You may not be able to "Sell" them at the game, but it seems that you could have a live link to the site and give them away free for donating to the server (there is even a PayPal link right there). Random fans in the stadium might also ask - "Hey, where did you get the shirt?"

How many non-members were you hoping to attract?
 
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Not sure, tho with how popular the shirts have been here we were hoping to extend our profits by selling them at the spring game (and maybe fall games too)... But it is good to know that we'd probably be covered legally by tying the shirts to donations to teh website... that would allow us to get all of our current orders off the ground
 
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I'm not a lawyer obviously, but...

OSU has to do whatever they can to protect what they feel is their trademark. If they let one guy use it, they have to let everybody. That's why they would go after even the smallest of enterprises.

That being said, I don't see how this would infringe.

To be on the safe side, you might not want to sell them at the spring game out in public. I'm sure you can drum up enough sales here on BP without exposing yourself to as much liability and scrutiny. I'm not sure what they could get you for as far as damages go, but I doubt we really want to find out.
 
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