I just got an email from somebody who sells their customs on Ebay, saying that his account was suspended indefinitely for "copyright infringement".

His exact words:

"ebay for some reason has suspended my account claiming its illegal for me to sell repainted transformer toys as its infringement of copyrights of productionists"

Is this right? I'm not up on copyright laws as they pertain to toy repaints.

I see plenty of other customs on Ebay right now, so I wonder what the deal is.

More than likely somebody complained to eBay out of spite and the "indefinite" reaction is eBay not knowing how to handle it. Selling a movie Prime figure as-is and selling a movie Prime figure covered in white paint and calling it Ultra Magnus really shouldn't count as two different things. Customizing a single figure shouldn't break any copyrights if selling a non customized figure doesn't. The figure was still made by Hasbro, you're just modifying it. You don't see eBay pulling auctions for cars that have been modified do you? Just like Ford isn't going to take action against a person repainting one of their cars and selling it, Hasbro isn't going to go after someone for repainting a Transformer. The only time I could see this being an issue is if mass production is involved and then only that is a problem if you use copyrighted names and logos. If this was an issue there wouldn't be a custom contest at BotCon.

Emerje

Whoo... that's touchy. So far as I have understood it, an item had to be altered at least 10% from original design to be considered not being infringement on copyright.

That being said, I doubt that Hasbro is going around pulling these auctions. It's more than likely what Emerje said. Some spiteful person is blowing a whistle and the subpar support at eBay isn't sure how to handle it. I personally loathe eBay in cases like this. They have definitely gotten too big for their britches and filled their empire with unqualified lackeys.

What cracks me up is that they enforce questionable acts like this (which should be fine), yet you could complain until you're blue in the face about scalpers that charge illegal fees (like a PayPal surcharge) and nothing gets done.

Ebay itself is in a questionable position with regards to copyright issues.

When you consider recent court rulings against P2P service providers and some other websites have found them to be liable for all use and piracy of unlawfully utilized copyrighted material, the fact that Ebay hosts millions of auctions a day which feature copyrighted logos and images, not to mention the plague of auctions featuring embedded music files for which no royalties are being paid, they are in what looks like a very vulnerable legal position.

Recent court rulings against the likes of Kazaa have shown that a service provider does not have to actively attempt to break copyright law to be held responsible for all instances of it on their site.

Additionally, the MPAA and RIAA hate the secondary market. When you buy from a reseller instead of going to a store, you gain possession of their intellectual property without paying a royalty to them. They've tried before to take resellers to court and failed, but I wouldn't put it past them to try again - and, as a hosting site for the secondary market, Ebay would be the front-line of that war.

Considering all that, for Ebay to consider a customized figure an act of willful copyright infringement which can be punished with an indefinite suspension is ridiculous - the equivalent of a nude man reporting you to the authorities for forgetting to wear socks.

I couldn't tell you the amount of bootleg anime I discovered on ebay back before broadband. They took a nice hefty chunk out of it at both ends, eBay and PayPal, every time. Same as they do for these pricey customs that people put so much hard work into, which is leaps and bounds above and incomparable to bootlegging. They end up acting hypocritically, sortof, but really they're just headless and stupid.

Y'know, it's one thing to try and stop knock-offs of legitimate products. But to stop customized Powerglideing toys? Jesus Jumping Christ on a Goddamn pogo stick...

Next thing you know, they'll decide it's illegal to sell anything "Transformers" because it might infringe on the power companies rights or something. Powerglide, this is ridiculous. :

it's like the game company asking Gamestop to stop selling used games

Nonsense, there's plenty of customs on ebay right now.

http://toys.search.ebay.com/custom-Transfo...ZR40QQsacatZ220

if they ban you they should also ban all the KNOCK-OFF wave that is going on now, because a custom re-paint is not a violation of copyrights but simply getting an existing figure (the one you bought legally) adding something else (new head,paint or whatever you want) and charging for your idea (the add ons)

Now the knock offs really violate copyrights and they even use H*sbr* and Taka*a copyrights on them!! what is this? maybe this so called knock offs are in fact a second "unoficial" H*sbr* and Taka*a black market line?, they cannot be banned but you can, get a lawyer man!!

interesting...

This would be about right for ebay, ban cutoms but keep the 1000's of auctions which peddle KO Blote from all over the world

maybe you can't mention the name HASBRO when selling customs.