Would it be an infringement to steal product images?

Legal analysis: Theft of product images is an infringement. Reproduction, distribution, performance, screening, broadcasting, compilation, or dissemination of works to the public through information networks without the permission of the copyright owner constitutes an infringement of copyright. If there is evidence that a company or individual owns the copyright of the photo or written work, a warning letter can be issued to the infringer and required to delete the infringing images and content on the relevant website, or the company or individual can resort to law and require the infringer to compensate for losses.

Legal basis: Article 49 of the Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China. If a copyright or copyright-related rights are infringed, the infringer shall compensate the right holder according to the actual loss; actual loss If it is difficult to calculate, compensation may be awarded based on the illegal income of the infringer. The amount of compensation should also include the reasonable expenses paid by the right owner to stop the infringement.

If the actual losses of the right holder or the illegal gains of the infringer cannot be determined, the People's Court shall, based on the circumstances of the infringement, award a compensation of less than 500,000 yuan. How is image infringement defined and what are the conditions for determination?

For each of us, we all enjoy some rights to intellectual achievements and labor results, just like the pictures we take or the electronic versions of paintings we draw belong to us. a right to the fruits of labor.

When we indicate that we cannot re-upload, re-modify or use our own things for commercial purposes, if others use our pictures without our permission, it constitutes a kind of infringement. problem.

Malicious tampering and theft

When each of us makes our own pictures, they are the fruits of our own personal labor. When we have clearly expressed these things Others are not allowed to use it, so if others use our pictures at this time, they need our authorization. For example, some people maliciously tampered with our pictures when they saw them and wanted to upload them, tampering with the source and the original color of the pictures. This has caused picture infringement to a certain extent. Or directly take our pictures and send them to others on our publicly released website, or upload them to the Internet again, which will also cause infringement issues.

Use for commercial use

The most obvious problem of image infringement is to put our own private images on the Internet, or to use them on products for profitable commercial use, which is the most serious one. image infringement issues. Not only does the use of our pictures infringe on the fruits of our labor and personal portrait rights, it even produces a profit-making effect. This is picture infringement. If we can provide the source of genuine pictures, then we can seek help from the police and safeguard our legitimate rights and interests.

Copyright Awareness

Intellectual property is the greatest wealth for each of us. We must maintain the copyright of our personal pictures. If someone needs to appreciate our pictures, we can do so appropriately. Allow them to take it. But if it is for commercial profit, then we should let them communicate with us before using it. When we find that we have suffered from image infringement, we must take up legal weapons to protect our legal rights. Do Amazon sellers really know about copyright infringement?

So, how can Amazon sellers avoid infringement?

On the Amazon platform, infringement is a very serious violation. Amazon's handling of infringement is generally strict, ranging from removing products from the shelves to shutting down the business directly.

Some of these infringements come from self-inspections on the Amazon platform, some come from sellers’ complaints, and some come from professional anti-counterfeiting law firms.

As long as your product is suspected of infringement, it will be difficult to survive on the platform. There is always a way to make your infringing product disappear.

Therefore, it is very important for sellers to conduct preliminary infringement prevention operations before the product is launched online.

The following takes the Amazon US site as an example to talk about how sellers can avoid infringement.

There are two main categories of infringement on US sites:

Trademark infringement and patent infringement.

Among them, patent infringement is divided into invention patent infringement and design patent infringement.

1. Trademark infringement

As long as it is a trademark registered in the United States, any use of the trademark without the permission of the right owner is considered trademark infringement.

Trademark infringement mainly comes from mindless follow-up sales.

We know that copycat selling is an operating model allowed by the Amazon platform, but copycat selling of brands is not allowed.

As long as the brand sellers who are being followed by others complain in the background, the success rate is still very high.

So, as a seller, how do you check whether a trademark is a registered trademark?

First, open the official website of the US Trademark Office and select ‘Trademark Electronic Search System (TESS)’.

Then, enter the trademark name you want to query in the search term.

Click submitQuery to see all registered trademarks under the search conditions.

Click on any trademark, and you can see a series of information such as the trademark's registered category, rights holder information, and registered address.

2. Invention patents

The search for invention patents is similar to that of trademarks. You can also log on to the website of the US Trademark Office.

After logging in to the official website, select Patents, select "search for patents" in the drop-down box

Then select "Quicksearch".

Enter the product keyword you want to query in the quick search, and you can get the product search results under that keyword.

The keyword we entered is "massagegun". Click on any search result to see the details and design drawings of the patent.

3. Design patents

Design patents can also be searched according to the method of invention patents.

Just like this monkey toy, the design drawings of the monkey can also be found through the above method.

So, for this kind of appearance patent, what is the basis for determining whether it is infringed?

Amazon’s standard for judgment is the “perspective of ordinary consumers.”

In other words, when a product is compared with another patented product, it is difficult for ordinary consumers to distinguish the difference between the two, and the similar behavior will affect the consumer's choice. Appearance infringement will be determined.

Actually, this criterion is more straightforward, it is “observation with the naked eye”.

If you think two products look very similar, then there is a high probability that they will be judged as infringing.

Most of the popular products on the Amazon platform that sell well but have few sellers have design patents.

That’s it for today’s article.

(Source: cross-border veteran Mike)