OK, it seems I'm playing the devil's advocate here, but your points are well worth addressing.
Originally Posted by
njkayaker
No, they'd just need to know about it (which they might not) and defend their trademark (which many people see as "petty" even though it's mostly required). No "damage to their reputation" is required to defend the use of their trademark.
But there is also such thing as
fair use (which I'm suggesting this may be), and in that case they generally can't complain unless the would-be fair use is rather
unfair and damaging.
If it's so meaningless, why even produce it? If it's so meaningless, why even buy it?
Great question. It's produced because it has visual appeal, and it's bought (well, not by me just yet) for the same reason. In the case of the A&S kit, nobody is buying or selling soap or coffee, nobody cares about A&S or Mokambo particularly or has the least interest in any of it at the moment, what's being marketed is a red and white skinsuit that just happens to have their logos (and a few others) on it. We found an old design that was cool looking. If it really belongs to someone else, they need to claim it, but if it doesn't - if they discarded it, no harm, no foul.
It's really this that I'm arguing against. It's sounds sort of like extortion (providing a "service" and then asking for payment).
The company might not want the "generated interest". They might even see it as a bad thing.
A lot of people are surprised by the laws that deal with salvage. It's not extortion, it's compensation for going to the trouble of recovering something. Salvage is an honest line of work, and if no one did it, valuable things would be lost for good. If the original owner wants it back, they can get it back, they just have to face the fact that that they lost or abandoned it and compensate the party that went to the trouble of recovering it. If nobody was in the salvage business, they'd
never get it back. If they didn't intend to use it, (in this case, the graphic design of a skinsuit) abandoned it and don't make any effort to claim it, it's absolutely the property of the party that recovered it for their own use.
It's more like creating a new movie with product placement (and product placement is a big deal). An old movie is a historical article (created in the past). You are talking about people manufacturing new clothing.
Maybe new prints, but ostensibly it's the same movie. The kit I've been talking about is a replica, not a new design that happens to have the A&S and other logos on it. But yes, it is a new individual garment that I've been tempted to buy. Which is why I keep going back to the question of who made them originally. Still haven't figured that out. I mean, if there's any doubt, we do need to make a reasonable effort to determine whether we'd be receiving stolen property, right?