Can i use brand logos on a website template I&#39;m going to be selling? I'm working on a website template that I intend to sell on a marketplace where people can buy and sell templates (i.e. ThemeForest). I'd like this template to have a "Featured In" section where I'd like to put some logos from publishers (i.e. NYTimes, TechCrunch). These wouldn't be actual logos people who would buy my template would keep - they'd be just placeholders. Is this something I can legally do? To give you a 100% clear idea, here's an example from Slack.com:
The standard for fair use of trademarks is as follows: (1) the product or service in question is not readily identifiable without use of the trademark (2) only so much of the mark as is reasonably necessary to identify the product or service is used (3) use of the mark does not suggest sponsorship or endorsement by the trademark owner. I think you might run into a problem with (1). In other words the trademark owner would argue that you could have used fake trademarks to satisfy your product description needs, so you are using their trademark unnecessarily.
The length of a literary work doesn't determine if its use is fair use. Copyright does not cover names, titles of works, catchwords/catchphrases/advertising slogans etc. or lists of ingredients (like in a recipe or chemical instructions), however, the procedure can be copyright. The work must also be original. If the tweet copies something that already exists then there is no copyright in the tweet - if the thing that is copied has copyright protection then the tweet itself may be a violation. That said, assuming that the Tweet enjoys copyright protection, the owner will be the author: presumably the owner of the Twitter account. For anyone else to legally use it, the use must be either: Licensed by the copyright owner Fair use (USA) or Fair Dealing (most everywhere else in the English speaking world) For Item 1, the Twitter terms of service say: You retain your rights to any Content you submit, post or display on or through the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying Content on or through the Services, you grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, reproduce, process, adapt, modify, publish, transmit, display and distribute such Content in any and all media or distribution methods (now known or later developed). In case you don't know what that means, Twitter gives you this plain English summary: Tip: This license is you authorizing us to make your Tweets on the Twitter Services available to the rest of the world and to let others do the same. So, you can get permission from the copyright holder or from Twitter. Well, Twitter has given permission: Except as permitted through the Twitter Services, these Terms, or the terms provided on dev.twitter.com, you have to use the Twitter API if you want to reproduce, modify, create derivative works, distribute, sell, transfer, publicly display, publicly perform, transmit, or otherwise use the Twitter Services or Content on the Twitter Services. Providing you use their API, you can "reproduce, modify, create derivative works, distribute, sell, transfer, publicly display, publicly perform, transmit, or otherwise use the ... Content ..." Therefore, fair use/dealing considerations are irrelevant.
Amy may use the names, and possibly the logos, of software products and their makers in producing instructional and educational materiel about such software. This is an example of nominative use. (Product names are not protected by copyright, and so copyright infringement will not be relevant. Trademark protection will be.) Nominative use means using the trademark as the name of the product or service associated with the mark. This is generally permitted. In many jurisdictions nominative use is limited to the use of the smallest amount of the trademark that will severe to identify the subject. This often means that use of the text name is permitted, but use of the logo, and the trade dress (the specific colors and fonts used on a name to make it a recognizable trasement, suh as the srylized script used for &quot;coca-cola&quot;) is nort permitted withotu permission. The question says that &quot;Amy has a cheat sheet (based on console commands or key bindings)...&quot; If any wrote the cheat sheet herself, there is no problem. If she copied it without permission, that is quite likely to be a copyright infringement on its own, unless the sheet is a list of facts in a natural or obvious order, with no creativity involved in its creation.
No it’s not illegal It’s called retailing: https://youtu.be/ywSkKkuGQ2A https://youtu.be/k8OreiHU91Y https://youtu.be/XpR6y1sNArU You are allowed to advertise the products you sell. Even if you don’t make them. You can even use their trademarks to identify them - that’s what trademarks are for.
Simply admitting that the images are not yours does not give you the right to use them. The fact that you are not profitting from them does not change this. There is no magical statement or disclaimer that will change this. If your use of the images constitutes Fair Use (since you're not mentioning how you're using them, it probably doesn't), you can include a fair use disclaimer. Sample dislaimers can be found online. A disclaimer should include the following: A statement that the work in question is not yours That the use falls under Fair Use and why Section 107 of the copyright act
No If they have prior usage then they have the trademark already and are the only ones who can register it. Trademarks arise through use - registration is not required.
Check your license from shutterstock what you are allowed to do with these images. They allow you, for appropriate payment, to publish their original images on your website. There is no reason why you couldn't ask them for a license to create an image derived from their original and publish it on your website. Anyway, according to your description, you created a derived work of the shutterstock images. Which is copyright infringement unless your license from shutterstock allows this. You have of course copyright on your modifications, but shutterstock also has a copyright on your work, because it is derived from theirs. If you have no license to create a derived work, then publishing it makes the situation worse. To answer your question: Legally, by getting an appropriate license. Illegally, by creating a work with so little similarity that you are not suspected.
Bringing fair use into this sounds iffy if you are partnering -- that is a commercial relationship which should be defined. If they did send you a file with their logo for a specific purpose, you can assume that you are allowed to use it for that specific purpose. If they did not send you the file, you can assume that they did not give you permission, or they would have included the file ...