Judge rules against builder of Batmobile replicas

Chris Tutor — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 08:44:00 EST

A federal judge has ruled that Batmobile replicas built by Mark Towle, of Gotham Garage, do, in fact, infringe on copyrights and trademarks held by Warner Bros.

Towle's attorney, Larry Zerner, argued that US copyright law doesn't allow "useful articles" to be copyrighted. Zerner, in court documents, insisted that Warner Brothers' lawsuit claimed the entire Batmobile was protected including doors, seats and tires. The judge agreed, but ruled the law does allow copyrighting of unique design elements of useful articles.

"The implications of a ruling upholding this standard are easy to imagine," Zerner wrote. "Ford, Toyota, Ferrari and Honda would start publishing comic books so that they could protect what, up until now, was unprotectable."

US District Judge Ronald Lew disagreed and ruled that, "The Batmobile is a character and exists in both two- and three-dimensional forms. Its existence in three-dimensional form is the consequence of the Batmobile's portrayal in the 1989 live-motion film and 1966 television series.

"Defendant did not copy the design of a mere car; he copied the Batmobile character," Lew continued. "The fact that the unauthorized Batmoble replicas that Defendant manufactured - which are derivative works - may be 'useful articles' is irrelevant. A derivative work can still infringe the underlying copyrighted work even if the derivative work is not independently entitled to copyright protection."

Zerner did, however, duck part of the lawsuit that asserted he willfully infringed on Warner's rights. The judge wrote that Zerner did at least wait until the design patents on the cars expired, and therefore didn't think copyright law applied.

Meanwhile we look forward to the Ferrari comic books.

The entire 54-page court ruling can be read here in PDF form.

Judge rules against builder of Batmobile replicas originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 13 Feb 2013 08:44:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Movie studio looking to move into Ford's abandoned Wixom plant

Jeremy Korzeniewski — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 08:02:00 EST

Filed under: Plants/Manufacturing, Ford

After over a year of being shuttered, Ford's abandoned plant in Wixom, Michigan could get a new lease on life in the form of a movie studio. Rumor has it that Warner Brothers Pictures is considering taking up residence in the ex-auto plant for a short period, though Ford may want something a bit more long-term. The production company has confirmed that it toured the plant for the first time about four months ago with officials from Ford present. When contacted for comment, a Ford spokesperson said only that the automaker would prefer to do something worthwhile with its old plant, but had no announcements to make.

Measuring in at over four-million square-feet, the old building has plenty of room and Warner Bros. would build a "small city" around the space, hiring between sixty and one-hundred permanent employees plus many part-timers and contract workers -- certainly a boon for the city's lagging economy -- not to mention starting the careers of a whole new generation of paparazzi.

[Source: The Detroit News]

Movie studio looking to move into Ford's abandoned Wixom plant originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 21 Aug 2008 08:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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