ghostrider

Right or wrong, consider the facts of this case.
This is a well-known company with probably more than enough money to take you to court.
You asked and were formally denined permission to make and sell multiple copies of the design so they now know your name and probably the sales venue as well.
The question you have to answer is this: are you willing to risk a court battle to prove the company is over reaching its authority?

Geri B

Oh, don't you wish you had the $$$ and influence to do it....just once!

Onebyone

Rules and restrictions are not protected under the copyright law. You can choose to follow the rule set by the designer or ignore them. Of course the company will say no to breaking a rule, it's their rule. Frankly I wouldn't have asked as long as I wasn't selling copies of the disc, pattern, or instructions.

Bubbie

Copyrights protect this designer from you using his/her WRITTEN directions (you may NOT copy in any way shape or form), and sell or give them away (or use them in teaching classes). This also hold true on his/her PICTURES of the finished work (like on the outside of the pattern or from books). These are the ONLY items that they have sold to you. The work you do is YOURS. Like most of us, you will end up changing things in some way after you've used this pattern for the first time. Small changes not adding the binding the same way, making your boarders larger or smaller or even skipping the boarders all together. I've taken embroidery patterns and turned them into appliques, have also turned appliqued patterns into embroidery work. I have problems with people who try to scare others into reading more into what is legal as well as what is enforceable. I live in an area that a few years ago a man was running for mayor of the city, like most people running he had signs printed up with his NAME on them. One of the things that got peoples attention, was when it when he received a "Seas and Deceits" letter. All it did was get this mans name more attention as well as the company who wanted him to STOP using "It's Name", all because he had the same legal name as a Trade Marked name. Don't think the company didn't end up with some EGG on it's face, they couldn't stop him from using his own name. So Trade Marks and Copyrights all have limits. Don't let them bluff you.

twinkie

Good luck on this subject. It is very confusing to me.

lclang

I have gotten so I look on the back of the pattern. If they have posted that you cannot use their pattern for anything but home use, I put the pattern back and DO NOT BUY IT! So they lose a sale just by posting that. I don't believe it is enforceable, but there are plenty of patterns that don't have that statement for sale or even free.

rjwilder

Copyright laws are confusing for sure. Printed books are copyrighted but we sure see a ton of them in used book stores, garage sales and thrift stores. They are being read and sold numerous times. Seriously what company is going to track me down and sue me for copyright infringement? They don't have the time, sure they may have the money but who knows. There are many sites on line that are file sharing sites, Hightail, Dropbox, etc., that people share designs on all the time. Those are the types of things the big companies will target, not a house mouse like me selling goods at a craft fair. My SIL has been selling embroidered items at a flea market for 6 years, the police raided the flea market looking for designer knock off's, big money makers, they don't care about the little crafters.

yobrosew

Your finished product is not a copy of their pattern. It is a creative expression, as well as a useful item, of a pattern you purchased for the express purpose to make something and using is not a copy of the pattern. Not by a long shot. Like mentioned above you cannot copy the pattern and sell or even give to others. So, if at your gathering you come ready with a stack, copied on your printer, a bunch of templates and patterns and sell then, you are oh, so wrong and infringing. However, to go stacked with completed quilts, well, sell away! You do not even have to give credit to the pattern designer although does not hurt to do so. Some of are of the mindset of late, with all the confusion created on the internet about this very simple concept, that to give credit is to give your property (quilts) rights over to the pattern maker/designer and thus the company can claim, based upon surrender, claim your all or part of your profits, as well as order a cease and desist from making and selling or insisting a new pattern be purchased for each produced quilt. How desperate is that of a pattern company?

bjchad

Not to open a whole new can of worms but this might not be a copyright issue per se but a licensing issue. However I seem to remember that the courts have held that license restrictions that are not readily visible before the item is purchased are not enforceable. I seem to remember that software companies tried to claim restrictions that were not spelled out before the purchaser bought the item and lost their cases. Not a lawyer but should think this would follow the same logic. However, as Ghostrider said, they have the money to make trouble so you may not want to get into the hassle and expense.

k_jupiter

First off, used books are sell able. Copyright doesn't prevent you from selling a book that you bought to someone else. You just can't make copies of it in any form before you do so. Selling items from a pattern as long as you are not mass marketing them is legal too as long as you attribute the work to the designer. It's called fair use clause of the copywrite law. The note on the quilt should say "Designed by XXX, pieced and quilted by YOU".
So don't pass the work off as your own and don't make several hundred copies of it. You would need a commercial agreement with the designer to do that and they would collect royalties for each copy you made. But making onesies or twosies of a design is not copywrite infringement. Quilt away I say. tim in san jose