This is not a for sale ad, but check this out...

[RedGuitars]

Not mine - on TGP...

Sims custom shop Shredder? looks like PRS counterfeit birds to me!

http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=1454379

 

[themike]

Yeah but Sims is a customshop/builder so since its not a production model, I doubt much can be done. If he was running them off and advertising them I'd say it would be a big issue for sure. Still an area with shades of gray though, that's for sure.

I guess sometimes you just want something PRS doesn't make in core. Like Matt has a KXK which looks like a 7 string semi hollow PRS that is simply stunning and if PRS made a version of it I would own one.

 

[László]

Yeah but Sims is a customshop/builder so since its not a production model, I doubt much can be done. If he was running them off and advertising them I'd say it would be a big issue for sure.

The use of the birds would most likely be held to be a trademark violation regardless of custom build, if it were to ever go to court. There are state and federal trademark laws that would still apply.

There isn't a federal court that has ever decided otherwise regarding a registered trademark, which the birds certainly are.

 

[sergiodeblanc]

Looks like one of those M.I.C. knock-off necks (from the pic).

 

[watelessness]

The use of the birds would most likely be held to be a trademark violation regardless of custom build, if it were to ever go to court. There are state and federal trademark laws that would still apply.

There isn't a federal court that has ever decided otherwise regarding a registered trademark, which the birds certainly are.

didn't the birds originate in bird book?

 

[shinksma]

didn't the birds originate in bird book?

I believe that is what I read. But that doesn't mean PRS can't claim the silhouettes are their own design, or at least their own trademark when those shapes are applied to a guitar neck in that particular fashion. If the bird-book author/publisher hasn't claimed infringement of their own copyright by PRS using the silhouettes, then either they decided it wasn't close enough to bother with, or didn't think PRS was important enough to pursue. Either way, at this stage, it would probably be too late to make a claim - if you don't pursue infringements within a reasonable amount of time from their public occurrence, I believe the courts would say "too late, horse has already left the barn!"

Claiming something and proving it in a court of law are two different things, though, and often expensive for both parties to go to court. Which is why stuff often gets settled via lawyer letters and "fees/licenses".

IMHO, IANAL, YMMV, etc.

 

[CantankerousCarl]

That looks like a BM SE neck grafted onto an ESP or Schecter...interesting...

Not mine - on TGP...

Sims custom shop Shredder? looks like PRS counterfeit birds to me!

http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=1454379

 

[JMintzer]

The birds are most certainly trademarked. The fact that they originated in a birdwatching book matters not...