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Watchmakers issue cease-and-desists to smartwatch face creators
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MacNN Staff
Join Date: Jul 2012
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A number of major watch brands have been sending cease-and-desist notices to websites and individuals claimed to be offering smartwatch copies of trademarked or copyrighted name-brand watch faces without permission, a report says. Some smartwatches -- particularly ones based on Android Wear -- offer the ability to load custom face designs. A few people have been creating ones based on existing watches, however, triggering copyright and trademark complaints.
The brands issuing notices are said to include IWC, Panerai, Omega, Fossil, Armani, Michael Kors, Tissot, Certina, Swatch, Flik Flak, and Mondaine. One face download site, FaceRepo, notes that it has taken to keyword filtering to block infringing content before it can even be uploaded.
Next year's Apple Watch will likely only face this problem indirectly at best, through faces hacked into the firmware -- if it's even technically feasible. The stock firmware will have just 11 general designs, albeit customizable in terms of colors and smaller design elements. Apple is expected to offer, and perhaps sell, original and licensed watch faces for Apple Watch at some future point.
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Last edited by NewsPoster; Nov 24, 2014 at 07:10 PM.
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Senior User
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It's interesting clock makers can patent the look and feel of a geometric shape (the clock dial is after all just a circle divided into 12 or 24 hours with extra tick marks for individual minutes) while Apple isn't able to patent the design of an iPhone (of able to fight for its own patents in court). If I remember right, sun dials have been used for centuries and they look real close to the current clock design. Prior art???
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Moderator
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It's not a patent, it is a copyright claim. You can certainly make a watch face that has the numbers for 1-12 around the edge, but these appear to be essentially photos of existing watch faces.
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The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
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Senior User
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Copyright, patent, same type of thing. I don't like people blatantly copying anything but the ability to copyright a clock face and say anything that looks close is copying is stretching it. As for your description of making a watch face with 12 numbers, if they are the same font, then that is a copyright infraction. If the tick marks look too close to the railroad clock (whichever one it was), as Apple found out, that's an infraction. My statement still holds whether it's a patent or copyright, all other smartphone vendors copy Apple yet the courts refuse to uphold any of these violations so why are they upholding clock dial copyrights?
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Junior Member
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Android is based on ripped-off interface elements. It's no surprise that would extend to software, as well.
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You knew this was coming. Once you have a high resolution screen on a watch, anything and everything is going to show up as an option. I am looking forward to seeing some amazing watch faces that wouldn't work with a real watch. The possibilities are endless.
But what's the line about imitation being the sincerest form of flattery.....
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Senior User
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sure, a design can be copyrighted. What's so controversial about that? Why would Procter and Gamble go to the trouble of creating a distinctive look for Tide detergent products if Unilever could come along and create a carbon copy of it?
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Dedicated MacNNer
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Copyrighting (or trademarking) watch faces. Shoelace tie patterns may be next. It all sounds silly.
I think noncommercial use (free faces) should be made immune to claims.
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Moderator
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Originally Posted by prl99
Copyright, patent, same type of thing. I don't like people blatantly copying anything but the ability to copyright a clock face and say anything that looks close is copying is stretching it. As for your description of making a watch face with 12 numbers, if they are the same font, then that is a copyright infraction.
No, actually it isn't. It is quite hard to get a similar item classified as an infringing article. This is why luxury brands out their logo all over their things, because that logo is protected by trademark laws. I suspect that that is what these watch faces are infringing - if you take a photo of a watch, it will include the Rolex or Omega or whatever logo.
Not to mention that Rolex and Omega etc are owned by massive luxury conglomerates who have lawyers on retainer and can afford a lawsuit, and some guy on the Internet probably can't.
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The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
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hayesk
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prl99 by your login, you can't copyright a book because "it's just using the same 26 letters as everyone else. To claim that you can't copyright a design of a clock face is saying every design has already been done and new designs look the same as the old ones. This is false, the brands listed above that I'm familiar with all have unique designs that do not look like other brands. For example, Mondaine uses the official licensed design from the Swiss Railways whom Apple settled with for $21 million because the iOS 6 iPad clock app resembled it too much. That design is instantly recognizable, you can't say with any validity that it's the same as other brands of clocks and watches.
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