[328] in Humor
HUMOR? Taking shots at toasters
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (abennett@MIT.EDU)
Wed Jun 15 22:06:39 1994
From: abennett@MIT.EDU
To: humor@MIT.EDU
Date: Wed, 15 Jun 94 22:04:08 EDT
Date: Wed, 15 Jun 1994 16:43:36 -0400 (EDT)
From: Steve Berczuk <berczuk@space.mit.edu>
From: Royce Buehler <buehler@sybil>
To: berczuk@sybil
Subject: Don't Start the Revolution Until My Lawyer Calls Your Lawyer
In article <Xairplane-toastersURde3_4uF@clarinet.com>, clarinews@clarinet.com (AP) writes:
> SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- The Jefferson Airplane hasn't taken flight
> musically for more than two decades, but it landed in federal court
> this week with claims that a computer software company stole an
> album cover's ``flying toaster'' design.
> A lawsuit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco
> claims Berkeley Systems, Inc. infringed on the band's copyright for
> its 1973 album cover on ``Thirty Seconds Over Winterland,'' by
> copying the design.
> The album, the group's last, showed a flock of winged toasters
> with clock dials flying in formation. Similarly aeronautical
> toasters appear in Berkeley Systems' best-selling ``After Dark''
> screen-saver computer program.
> Screen savers protect computer screens from being imprinted by a
> fixed image when a computer is left on.
> Berkeley systems denied the claims, saying the best-selling
> flying toasters program was ``independently created.''
> ``We were completely unaware of the album at the time,''
> Berkeley Systems president Wes Boyd said in a statement.
> Although the Airplane isn't in the computer business, anyone
> planning to use its copyrighted works for a product should seek
> permission and pay a license fee, the band's lawyer, Joseph
> Anderson, said Tuesday.
> The winged toaster program has been in use since 1989. But the
> lawsuit by a company representing Jefferson Airplane's interests
> said the musicians first became aware of the screen saver last year
> in articles about a suit by Berkeley Systems against another
> company that was also using flying toasters in its screen saver.
> In that suit, a federal judge ordered the competing company to
> stop using a program that showed a character from the ``Bloom
> County'' comic strip firing shots at flying toasters.
> The suit filed Tuesday says Berkeley Systems copied the toasters
> consciously or unconsciously, creating the false impression that
> the rock group was associated with the screen saver. It seeks
> Berkeley Systems' profits from the program and an order halting
> further sales.
