This just in …….. those planning a Christmas party this year might want to think twice about it unless of course they have first contacted Santa Claus and licensed the use of the name Christmas. Any person or persons caught having fun in the name of Christmas, will be pursued to the fullest extent of the law.
Sound stupid? Well although this Christmas story was just a joke, turns out the story has some basis in truth. A recent industry lawyer via Twitter (@PornLaw) has made some no so vague threats to any promoters hosting a party without first licensing the use of the event name, Exxxotica.
I can’t tell you how many “AVN Awards” parties, pre-parties, and after-parties I have been to in my life and I’m sure all of them didn’t pay AVN a fee for the right to celebrate the award show. I could be wrong but AVN seems to even go out of their way to encourage people partying to celebrate the award nominations and wins.
For awhile now we’ve been hearing rumors about companies who are hard up for money that have been trying to make extra money through pushy and aggressive lawyers.
In fact, there is one adult studio who themselves are having some serious legal troubles that have recently found themselves very hard up for cash. Years prior they had made several verbal agreements to use certain scenes or parts of those scenes for marketing purposes to various websites. There was nothing ever put in writing, from what I heard it was all a very casual arrangement. Then one day when they found themselves in dire need of money, their lawyer came up with a great idea, go after all those people who don’t have written permission to use their trademarked material.
One inside source tells me that the law always for $150,000 per trademark violation. But often times they go after a company just to get them to settle for a quick $10,000 to $20,000.
The economy is bad, I get it. But this is a new low, even for our industry who has made billions on the down and dirty.
So I’ve made a decision of my own. I personally find these kind of douchy lawyers annoying so I will not be spending my money to attend the Exxxotica show this year or in the future, nor will I be posting any stories about it, including all those press releases about so and so appearing or so and so having a party.
Just to be clear here, I get wanting to protect your trademark. But there is a vast difference between protecting your trademark and just being an annoying bitch.
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