Legalities of Selling Things Based on Historical Figures

Either:

a/ The maker had permission to market this piece.

b/ Reeve and his agents didn't think it was politic to send out the equivalent of a Ceases and Desist letter.

c/ The maker has not done anything that was unlawful, he almost certainly not done anything that is illegal in most places.

I think we can reasonably agree (as intelligent people here) that what happens with A LOT of VERY popular models on Shapeways would be option B. The fact that the agents/actors/IP holders don't know/care about these obvious legal breaches does not absolve those who benefit nor does it preclude any further negative action against the provider.

My sense is that this will be a problem in the future and Shapeways has the most at stake.

Spanners in the works :twisted:

Hypothetically, I am a celebrity who has spent money crafting my looks via plastic surgery, does my likness come under 'Design Rights' rules?

I use my computer as a tool to create virtual models on screen, when I save that model, is that model not computer generated? (I certainly don't have the time or know-how to create the file manually in a text editor)

Paul

Shapeways has made it clear that they honor DMCA takedown requests. And the reason they do not take
a more active role in investigating "dubious" content is probably that they do not want to be held responsible -
i.e. they can claim "save haven" status. So any repercussions from Sad Keanu et al. should be limited to the
designer (save for lost revenue at shapeways - but I doubt that memes and "fan art" make up more than a low
percentage of model sales).

And regarding the shorter copyright time frame for "computer-generated work", my understanding is that this
applies only to fully automatic renderings without artistic input or intervention, e.g. an X/Y graph derived from
a set of data points. (generated by computer in circumstances such that there is no human author of the work
appears to be the wording in s. 178 of the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988 that Bill Bedford quoted,
and a 1992 amendment further qualifies that author of a literary, dramatic, musical or artistic work or computer program
which is computer-generated, means the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the creation of the work were undertaken)

I remember (from school) that computer generated art is anything that has no psychical equivalent. It exist only in digital word, in 0 and 1.
If you write a book with computer and keep it as e-book than it is computer generated art. If you print it than it is both. Classic book with classic copyright with digital alternative.

So i think that 3D prints would have same protection as has statues made of marble (or anything else)

But i could be wrong