8mm Forum: Yet another troubling development at ebay ...

This is topic Yet another troubling development at ebay ... in forum General Yak at 8mm Forum.

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Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on January 17, 2014, 12:59 PM:

I received a message that one of the items that I listed was taken down, the John Wayne triple trailer auction. They stated that it is a copyright violation.

What's frustrating is that, while these trailers might be copyrighted again these days, when they were printed on super 8 film stock all those years ago, they were not under copyright, so anybody could print them ...

... but trying to convince these people that these prints were made back when these films were out of copyright is harder than pulling teeth out of a live lions mouth,

... and I'm betting, that THAT is rather hard!

Posted by Rob Young. (Member # 131) on January 17, 2014, 01:32 PM:

Interesting that, Osi, because even the studios don't get bothered about trailers; they see them as promotional material, so the more of them out there the better.

Unless a company has specifically paid for rights to distribute these trailers as DVD extras, which, quite frankly, is unlikely.

Posted by Brian Stearns (Member # 3792) on January 17, 2014, 08:42 PM:

Maybe you should call the studio and ask if they want it back. [Smile]

Ebay has gotten too strict

Posted by Terry Sills (Member # 3309) on January 18, 2014, 03:13 AM:

How I hate Ebay with their stupid inflexible rules and regulations and how I wish there was a credible alternative. Wouldn't you have thought that bearing in mind the incredible success of this auction site, that someone would have set up an alternative site in competition. Hail the day.

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on January 18, 2014, 04:09 AM:

Has anybody had any experience with eBid?
http://uk.ebid.net/perl/main.cgi?go=1&mo=search&category=&type=keyword&words=super+8mm+film&go=

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on January 18, 2014, 11:33 AM:

Well, I'm going to call and see how high up of a supervior I can get at ebay, because I'm betting that ...

Most people who run ebay are 40 or under and probably don't even remember super 8 as a general rule ...

Same people probably do not realize that many of these copyrights were renewed after super 8 was printed. back in the days of super 8 (it's heyday) many classic features (It's A Wonderful life, for instance) had run out of they're copyright and were therefore fair game, but these young ebay morons wouldn't know that.

(I won't call them morons on the phone) (snicker)

Posted by Terry Sills (Member # 3309) on January 18, 2014, 11:55 AM:

Maurice
Well done for finding an alternative site. Let's hope it grows to be credible competition. I will certainly keep an eye on it.

Posted by Bill Brandenstein (Member # 892) on January 21, 2014, 11:34 AM:

A disturbing development, to be sure. Osi, this was a Super 8 print, yes? Probably 30 years old?

One of the challenges of this hobby is that many products were legitimately licensed, but we can't prove it, while many others are purely bootleg. Put that aside, though, and consider copyright in general: once something expires from copyright, it can't (in the original form) be placed back into it. Plus, in most cases, anything first published after 1/1/1923 is still protected because the movie studios took care of their renewals more often than not. For more information on how long copyrights last, please see this excellent copyright flowchart.

In any case, Osi, these trailers are likely still protected as you presumed. So you can either make a case to them for it being a licensed product, or wait 6 months, create a new listing and hope that nobody notices!

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