Copyrights and Trademarks

A copyright protects works of authorship, such as writings, music, and works of art. A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol, and/or design that identifies and distinguishes the source of the goods of one party from those of others. Some companies will file for copyright and trademark protection for a logo, so if you hear a "barracks lawyer" telling you that something is trademarked, not copyrighted, and therefore he can ignore whatever you tell him, he may be wrong.

Trademarks are business-specific. Ace Hardware can prevent other companies from entering into the home-improvement and hardware store market using the name "Ace" because they already own that trademark. Ace Hardware has no bearing on Ace Bandages, however. Nobody will be likely to confuse the two markets, which is an important distinction to be aware of. If you start a company doing business as Survival Straps, the guys who already use that name for their company will probably come after you. Be wary, be smart, stay legal.

Images

Let's start with the giant caveat that this page makes no claims of legal advice, and that you should most assuredly check with a lawyer if you want a defensible answer on issues of fair use vs. copyright/trademark infringement. With that being said, images you own can be used with no problem. By "images you own" the law defines those as being images you took yourself with your own equipment and which do not depict trademarks or copyrighted material. Also, you can find stock photo repositories which have some free-to-use images, although some may have license against using them for profit, so be sure to read those.

In the United States of America, everything which is created is granted a degree of legal protection by default. So, if you see a cool picture on Flickr and it does not explicitly state that you can use it, but it also does not explicitly state you cannot use it - you cannot use it without permission. There are some exceptions which fall under "fair use" guidelines, but the law on that is vague and the case law is all over the place. In general, if you want to be completely safe and secure from doing anything illegal or ethically dubious, ask the creator or make your own images. You can also just buy a set of stock photos or graphics which are appropriately licensed for re-use in your business.

You will see people claim that they can use logos for their own use, which may be true, but it's still ethically dubious. You will also see people say that they'll make a charm with any user-supplied image, and if that image happens to be a trademark that is not licensed, it's not the charm-maker's responsibility to check the legal provenance. That is not true. If you are making a charm for someone, and you have reason to suspect the image is not theirs to use, you're still going to be legally responsible for the image being used, especially if you're charging for your work. When in doubt, erring on the side of caution will cause you less heartache.

Licensed materials

There are a lot of cases of companies trying to exert control after their legally-licensed product has been sold. There is a concept called "first sale doctrine" which covers a lot of this. Basically, once a product has been sold, it is no longer under control of the seller, unless there is a contract. Contracts which are not signed by both parties are not legally enforceable, in general (don't get started on end user license agreements for software, or we'll be here all day). So, if you buy a roll of Strawberry Shortcake fabric, you can make whatever you want with it and sell anything you want. You are not allowed to state or imply that you are making officially licensed Strawberry Shortcake items, but the fabric was sold without a contract and you can do what you want with it.

Protected Designs

Some people will claim that they invented a specific knot and that nobody else is allowed to use it without their permission. These people are, at best, misinformed. Some of them are also jerks. Practical instructions, such as how to tie a cord into a specific shape, cannot be protected by copyright or patent. They may apply for a patent, and wave their "patent pending" sign around, but until a patent is granted, it isn't real yet.

There is such a thing as manners, however. Within the knotting community, it is generally accepted behavior to acknowledge the discoverer or person who documented a specific knot design. It's also considered good manners to use the name the earliest-known discoverer gave the knot. Thus, when a company showed a design called the Piranha on Youtube, and were told that JD Lenzen has actually produced a tutorial for the same knot months earlier, they acknowledged the primacy of JD's Shark Jaw Bone. That's good behavior.