Legal advice for building guts and selling the pedal to someone else.

[Thecomedian]

Is a circuit itself protected from copy and use? Does anyone know the limitations or flexibility regarding building and selling pedals with specific forms of circuits in it?

[armdnrdy]

http://www.muzique.com/clones.htm

[Jdansti]

I'm not an attorney, but I play one on TV...


+1 for http://www.muzique.com/clones.htm

[Thecomedian]

thanks.

http://www.muzique.com/schem/mole.gif

suppose I use the circuit here and was going to sell it to someone. the way the circuit works is not patented, but the name of it, and any other distinctive marks or phrases related to it are trademarked. Does that mean you make your own name up? if you attribute the circuit to the originator, does that lessen or increase legal liability?

[greaser_au]

interesting threads...      
http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=31253.0
http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=81784.0

david

[Thecomedian]

So it looks like component values aren't granted to solely anyone, and "obvious" circuit designs are not protected. It might be better if I just think of it as build X.

[R.G.]

One huge bit of advice is that if you are thinking about doing something that you think may be legally questionable, ask a lawyer, a real one. Things you get from the internet are so questionable that the old quip about statistics has been perverted to "lies, d@mned lies, and the internet".

[Paul Marossy]

Things you get from the internet are so questionable that the old quip about statistics has been perverted to "lies, d@mned lies, and the internet".

But they can't put anything on the internet that isn't true.... 

[Jdansti]

Then there's ethics with regard to whether you are "stealing" when you copy a design.  I'm not talking about legal definitions of stealing here, but more of a perception of stealing.  This too has been covered in other threads.  There are different opinions on this just as you'd never get everyone to agree in a discussion on morals.  Here's a non-stompbox analogy:

Let's say I brought some food to work. I could give notice as to whether I intended this food to be for "community consumption" in several ways.

1) If I placed the food in my desk drawer in the morning, most reasonable people would assume that the food was not for community consumption, and most would understand that I'd be very unhappy if someone took it and ate it. This would be analogous to someone not publishing any information about their pedal design.

2) If the food were in a bag with my name on it and I placed it in the break room refrigerator, it would be more accessible to others, but it would be reasonable for me to be upset if someone ate it. This would be analogous to a DIYer publishing their design with a notice that the design was not for commercial use. (Not a perfect analogy.)

3) If I were to place the food on the break room table, and it was custom for anything left on the table to be for community consumption, then I shouldn't be upset if others were to eat the food. This would analogous to someone making their design public, as many companies and DIYers do. The published documents may have a copyright notice, but it's obvious that the owner is not trying to prevent someone from copying the work.

While there is some legal overlap, these examples mainly deal with the ethics of selling someone else's design.

Back to the legal aspect, the other thing to look at is how other businesses deal with the copying issue. If there are already 10 companies selling the exact circuit of a major manufacturer's pedal, and the big company hasn't challenged the smaller ones, then it's probably safe to say that the big company isn't interested in challenging these smaller companies, or else they have challenged them and were unsuccessful at stopping them. This is not a guarantee that you're safe, just a go-by.

Remember, I'm not an attorney, I just play one in my own mind...   All of the above is just my non-expert opinion, presented because I like to hear myself type.  As R.G. stated, check with an attorney for the real answers.

[midwayfair]

Edit: NM, I decided to stay out of this ...

[artifus]

sounds more like politics. i'm staying out too. 

[Jdansti]

Edit: NM, I decided to stay out of this ...

i'm staying out too. 

You are wiser men than I... 

[electricgrave]

To be honest I sell some of my clones on ebay. That's the only way to feed my DIY addiction though especially since I've been out of job for more than a year. But I sell only clones of pedals that are not produced anymore (at least by their original makers). After all, how else people can lay their hands on classic effects, without paying $300+ for the originals?

@Jdansti: with all respect, I never thought it was fair to compare food to copyrights, since if somebody takes your food, you won't have it anymore. It's not the same in case of somebody copying something from you. You still have your original, right? But of course there are a lot of other (ethical) aspects to it.

[Mac Walker]

Don't waste your money to consult a leech, just throw it in the toilet and flush it if you want it to go to better use.

Worst that can happen - a leech will send you a cease and desist letter, which will cost the person sending you this letter at least $500....

Do whatever you feel comfortable doing and don't worry about it.

No one is going to to waste their money to sue someone who presumably doesn't have any in the first place - (you are a pedal builder, so I can safely assume you are destitute and penniless, like the rest of us, right?)

[artifus]

^

also, try to be the change you'd like to see - just be preprepared (and justifiably able) to defend your point of view should it be argued against.

*eta* laws need challenging occasionally.

[Thecomedian]

So I could name a box with a generic or custom style appearance and slap on the name BCE distortion  and it would have either a diode clipped or a sat/cutoff transistored distortion effect, and it wouldnt step on any legal toes?

[tubegeek]

So I could name a box with a generic or custom style appearance and slap on the name BCE distortion  and it would have either a diode clipped or a sat/cutoff transistored distortion effect, and it wouldnt step on any legal toes?

Where do you see anybody saying that?

[R.G.]

So I could name a box with a generic or custom style appearance and slap on the name BCE distortion  and it would have either a diode clipped or a sat/cutoff transistored distortion effect, and it wouldnt step on any legal toes?

One huge bit of advice is that if you are thinking about doing something that you think may be legally questionable, ask a lawyer, a real one.

Internet advice is worth what you paid for it.

[Henry89789]

Another point in regard to copyright protection is that it may not be enough to just put the copyright symbol and the "All rights reserved" statement  on whatever it is one wants to protect and obtain full protection unless it is registered. But Section 408 of the copyright laws says "Such registration is not a condition of copyright protection."
But the law is confusing; the following statute seems to contradict Sec. 408:

§ 411 · Registration and civil infringement actions
(a) Except for an action brought for a violation of the rights of the author under
section 106A(a), and subject to the provisions of subsection (b), no civil action
for infringement of the copyright in any United States work shall be instituted
until preregistration or registration of the copyright claim has been made in accordance
with this title.

Sec.412 also seems to make registration a prerquisite to an infringement suit.
§ 412 · Registration as prerequisite to certain remedies
for infringement12
In any action under this title, other than an action brought for a violation of
the rights of the author under section 106A(a), an action for infringement of the
copyright of a work that has been preregistered under section 408(f) before the
commencement of the infringement and that has an effective date of registration
not later than the earlier of 3 months after the first publication of the work or 1
month after the copyright owner has learned of the infringement, or an action
instituted under section 411(c), no award of statutory damages or of attorney's
fees, as provided by sections 504 and 505, shall be made for—
(1) any infringement of copyright in an unpublished work commenced
before the effective date of its registration; or
(2) any infringement of copyright commenced after first publication of the
work and before the effective date of its registration, unless such registration
is made within three months after the first publication of the work.

Copyright protection usually deals with protecting the author of a work. So you couldn't take a design of a circuit written on paper  (or any medium) and sell the design as yours. But a pedal built from that design I THINK may be a different matter because the pedal is not the design; it is something else and one could argue that building the pedal is the reason that that the author designed the circuit and made it available and so can't reasonably expect that people won't build the pedal and do whatever they want with it.

[amptramp]

Another point in regard to copyright protection is that it may not be enough to just put the copyright symbol and the "All rights reserved" statement  on whatever it is one wants to protect and obtain full protection unless it is registered. But Section 408 of the copyright laws says "Such registration is not a condition of copyright protection."
But the law is confusing; the following statute seems to contradict Sec. 408:

Note that this is a peculiarity of US law only.  In Canada and most other countries, copyright is automatic and no registration is required.  What I am not sure of is whether the © or ® for a trademark need to appear before it is considered infringement.  Take the advice above: check with a lawyer.