This image of simple geometry is ineligible for copyright and therefore in the p

[Frog]

"This image of simple geometry is ineligible for copyright and therefore in the public domain, because it consists entirely of information that is common property and contains no original authorship."

Dan suggested that this would make an interesting discussion when I ran this down to him.

Yesterday, I was asked to use a popular symbol from the Harry Potter series. I got the usual "well it's only a few shirts", and so on.
I looked into it, and was a little surprised to see the reasoning, as stated in this post's heading, used in this Wikipedia article, as I feel that all art is made up of simple line segments and geometric shapes, merely in varying degrees. That's sort of the whole point of design.
I know that the whole copyright thing is ignored by many when there is a reduced fear of actual prosecution, and we all have our own "lines in the sand" on the morality of such use.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Deathly_Hallows_Sign.svg

[blue moon]

it is when those elements are arranged in a unique and recognizable form that they create something that can be defended in court for copyright violation. Each individual element is not copyrighted, but a combination of them together is.

or so my mind interprets the copyright laws. . .

pierre

[Hegemone]

I don't think the person was interested in an example of simple geometry. If so they wouldn't have referenced HP. I don't think this example of the comparison of areas of various shapes would be interesting to anyone as a design feature if it was not a reference to HP. My highschool math teacher excluded.

Since there is lots of money tied up in the franchise I would avoid it out of respect for the artist. who deserves their piece of the pie.  If it was only described in the text of the books then that would be an interesting point because then the customer could be referencing without taking someone else's graphic elements.

Might as well head off to Pottermore ad see what other things I should avoid.

**waves stick** STUPIFY..........


My two cents. Toss then in a well and make a wish.

[balloonguy]

I think we all know that this is the work of someone else. It may be simple but so is UM or FSU or UF. I won't print any of these! It just seems wrong to me.

[ScreenFoo]

It's an unauthorized and obvious derivative infringment by Harry Potter on the intellectual property of AA.   

[blue moon]

It's an unauthorized and obvious derivative infringment by Harry Potter on the intellectual property of AA.   

LOL, got a good chuckle out of that one!

[StuJohnston]

I am going to hazard a guess that the wikipedians haven't really looked into the copyright of that symbol very intensely. As in asking Rowling or her publisher if it was cool to use. In fact there is something that ticks me off here, "contains no original authorship" Someone made that symbol, it didn't just author itself into existence.

I was also reminded of the AA logo. If I see one, I know what it means. Even though it's just a circle and a triangle. Maybe they feel the same way about that logo, but it definitely belongs to AA. I went looking for it on wikipedia hoping that they said something similar about it, but it wasn't on the AA page.

[Screened Gear]

I think your reading the statement wrong. The "This image of simple geometry" is only describing the art. Its not saying why it is "ineligible for copyright". There has to be something missing about this. There are a few ways items can be considered Public domain. I would guess the art is past its copyright. Copyright is only so many years past the creation. Be it the death of the creator or so many year of use. We really need to know more about it to figure this all out. Now does it make it ok to use because its in the public domain? That's another series of questions about the use and a ton of other things. Don't forget copyright is only one way to protect a piece of art. There is also registering and trade marking. They all have their own rules and laws protecting them.

My answer to Copyright is: did you create it? Did you pay for it to be created? Did you obtain the right to use it (approval or purchase -NOTE: your inability to find the creator or owner does not give you rights to use it)? If not then no you can't use it.

[Frog]

Ya know, Wikipedia is user driven, and anyone can challenge , correct, or add to an article.
Apparently, they have something called "The Commons" which this is from, and is the place for non-copyrighted designs that can be re-used, and the information of such freedom to use is listed.
The problem is that this information is entered by an uploader who may be full of crap.

[Chadwick]

If one has a valid argument with wikipedia, one should express it.
I'm pretty sure that's the idea behind it.

[StuJohnston]

I think your reading the statement wrong. The "This image of simple geometry" is only describing the art. Its not saying why it is "ineligible for copyright". There has to be something missing about this. There are a few ways items can be considered Public domain. I would guess the art is past its copyright. Copyright is only so many years past the creation. Be it the death of the creator or so many year of use. We really need to know more about it to figure this all out. Now does it make it ok to use because its in the public domain? That's another series of questions about the use and a ton of other things. Don't forget copyright is only one way to protect a piece of art. There is also registering and trade marking. They all have their own rules and laws protecting them.

My answer to Copyright is: did you create it? Did you pay for it to be created? Did you obtain the right to use it (approval or purchase -NOTE: your inability to find the creator or owner does not give you rights to use it)? If not then no you can't use it.

I am pretty sure this is their why, "…because it consists entirely of information that is common property and contains no original authorship." the symbol was created for deathly hallows, I don't know when that came out, but well within the time period of valid copyright. According to this, http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-duration.html within 70 years.

I understand what you guys mean about discussing it with the wikipeople, but I would rather not fight a losing battle today.

I ran across this when I was trying to find out if that line about geometry was something official or something that wikipedia people came up with, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Old_Visa_Logo.svg The old visa logo is apparently also a work of simple geometry.

[Screened Gear]

I was thinking the logo created for deadly hallows was generated from an ancient logo. Its covered by the inspired by or derived from part of the copyright law (If it was a recreate of an old logo that was past its copyright protection then your new logo that was derived from that logo would be not copyrightable). I was just assuming. That the logo was derived from a very old version of a logo. It just looks like an ancient style of logo.

If you want to learn a little about the extremes of copyright protection get a book called Electronic Highway Robbery: An Artist's Guide to Copyrights in the Digital Era  I read it years ago. There are examples of some people that were sued and lost thousands for using images derived from or even just inspired by a copyrighted piece of art. its sick that they were even sued in some of the cases.

here is a link... http://www.amazon.com/Electronic-Highway-Robbery-Artists-Copyrights/dp/0201883937