Oh hey, I just found the company that makes the Star Wars fabric Mom used in our quilt. Turns out they make quite a few other designs. Ours is called (appropriately enough) “Vader’s Revenge”.
Incidentally, we had a long chat Friday night about the whole licensing issue thing. Mom was admonishing me for even mentioning selling the quilt because the fabric had apparently come with a big warning that you weren’t allowed to use it in products for resale. That sent Rodd off into a tangent about end-user license agreements and whether they’re valid if you don’t sign anything (which of course Mom hadn’t). I said that I thought you were allowed to sell derivative works, like collages that included copyrighted pictures. (Turns out I was wrong.) So it looks like selling it would be out of the question in terms of legality. It just seems really odd to think that I have a personal possession that I wouldn’t be allowed to sell in a garage sale (or on eBay). But wait – I didn’t make the quilt. It was gifted to me. So I should be able to sell it, right? I didn’t “manufacture” any products “for resale.” (Just to clarify, I wouldn’t dream of selling it. This is just an interesting thought exercise.) I wonder if anybody’s contested this one in court yet…
4 responses
Don’t worry about the legal things. Your mom bought the fabric – she didn’t copy it. Thus she can do what ever she wants with it. – Including selling the quilt. But as you say. Don’t sell it.
My wife makes a lot of textile art works. Indecently she bought some materials from you store this February.
I hope you won’t sue her when she sells her art using your materials.
http://katarina.scherman.nu
If you know a little Swedish you might want to read her notes from our last trip to Australia. http://australia.scherman.nu
/Per 🙂
Hi Per! (You e-mailed me before, didn’t you?) I’m not worried about anything Mom did being illegal; I know it’s not. It’s more the wording of the license in terms of making articles for resale. I just find it interesting. Your wife’s pieces are beautiful, but since they’re original works (I’m assuming) then you have no cause to worry. If she were knitting jumpers from a Jo Sharp pattern and selling them, though, she could get in trouble. Or stitching multiple copies of a Mirabilia design. You’ll find that most kits and patterns include a copyright notice forbidding their use to make articles for resale. I’m just interested in whether that license has been challenged and whether there are some grey areas. For instance, we have “stitchers for hire” that do work for customers like knitting sweaters or finishing cross stitches. Since the customer is providing the raw materials, my understanding is that this is perfectly legal. So what if someone wanted to commission my Mom to make them a similar quilt? If the customer provided all the raw materials, wouldn’t that be a legal way to get around the copyright notice? Would it matter whether the customer gave them to her or whether she sold them to the customer for cost? Like I said, this is all an interesting thought exercise that may only apply in certain countries anyway…
If the fabric comes with such a clear warning, the licensing agreement stands… no signature required, the purchase is consent to the terms. However, if someone were to hire your mom for her services to sew with materials they purchased, they would be paying for her sewing services, not the quilt itself. I’d say that would hold up… although I’m not an attorney. It seems most fabrics don’t have that issue… this is Star Wars & those images have more protection attached to them than other patterns would.
so how do I know if I’ve bought an licensed fabric. I just bought some fabric and I don’t see anything on it stating I cant resell.