Royalty payments, It's not just railroads

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

“Boeing have started demanding royalties for the use of their name and privately-owned designs, such as commercial aircraft. This is perfectly legal for them to do, as their name and their commercial aircraft represent their own intellectual property. However, the legal departments in these companies have not stopped there. Now they are pressing for licensing and royalty payments on aircraft designations such as B-52, P-51, and CH-46”

http://www.internetmodeler.com/2005/january/columns/editorial.php

Here is a trread on royaltyies from the Armorama modeling forum. The first post gives some backgrounf info, I had not seen before:

http://www.armorama.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=SquawkBox&file=index&req=viewtopic&topic_id=42520&page=1

2

The P-51 was builted by North American. Sorry I just found out that Boeing owns North American

3

Model car mfg.'s have had to do this for some years now. When I read about the RR companies making the
same demands, I wasn’t surprised at all.

4

There may be some merit to this for CURRENT properties, like UP, BNSF, NS, CSX, etc., and CURRENT production car, and CURRENT production aircraft.
But Fallen Flags, PLEASE. And 60+ year old aircraft that certainly are no longer being manufactured? That sort of thing is insane. Of course, these companies have every right to demand whatever they want. Just as I have every right to stop buying such products. And switch to a different road that doesn’t require royalty payments so I can still buy SOMETHING from the manufacturers.

–Randy

5

I used to spend way too much time in Flight Sim forums. For a while, there was a perceived problem of airlines demanding licensing royalties. Nothing ever really came of it, although they needed to “show the flag” and officially tell people that they are serious about protecting their intellectual property rights. Once they’ve huffed and puffed and scared the bejeebers out of a few small-time merchants, I guess that it’s then OK for them to “graciously” allow non-competitive use for simulation and modelling purposes. To my knowledge, Boeing has not complained at all about the thousands of Flight Sim aircraft and re-paints that are freely posted for download, or sold commercially in that community.

6

While I’m not a lawyer, the common sense of this to me is that trademark protection is to prevent the buying public from becoming confused. Therefore there seems to be no problem with Athearn making a boxcar with UP logo since no one is going to confuse Athearn selling a model with UP offering shipment of goods. Further these are things that appear or did appear in public and models should be considered fair use. But then who has the money to fight the big corporations?
Enjoy
Paul