Yeah, but again I don't see them going after people who make things for themselves, so I'm not worried about making a cake and eating it or drawing a picture and putting it on the wall. I think they may roll their eyes at me if I asked permission to draw a picture of Ariel to put on my daughter's bedroom wall. I think the laws are there to protect themselves from people TRYING to make money off of their image. But to each their own, if one feels it's wrong then they don't have to do it for themselves.

If the laws would be such that you can't even make a cake in your own home for your own use with their images then they could be losing out. Think of kids that like to decorate their own cakes for their bday. I know many who do. Now, imagine telling your own child that she can't decorate her own bday cake by drawing her own image of Minnie Mouse because Disney won't allow it. Come On, I know Disney and others are protecting their interests but at some point, it becomes rediculous. If you told your own child they couldn't decorate their own cake like this, they could just as well say, "well, I don't like so and so anymore."

For your own use, it should be okay.

As another issue, think of children who draw and reproduce copyrighted characters for their own entertainment in their own bedroom and then display their drawings on their walls. I see nothing wrong with this. Same issue for cakes in your own home.

Spectra, we are thinking along the same lines.

Hehe, yes indeed momtofourmonkeys.

A little off topic, but for Kerry Vincent admirers who would like to show her your cakes, ask questions and just interact here is a fun link

http://www.fantourage.com/fz/8420/kerry_vincent

She comments and replies personally- it's very cool!

Sassy74-

That's what has really hit home for me- the whole integrity thing. I guess the hope is that our motivation for obeying this and other laws comes from our desire to do the right thing rather than the fear of getting caught. I just think if we expect not to have our own "intellectual property" stolen, then we have to support this law. Even in the case of giant corporations, we might think we are not hurting anyone because they have plenty of money. It's the same law across the board for the little guys and the big guys. That is the only way it can be in a free enterprise, competitive market.

This thread has gone to "splitting hairs" and some are missing the point. Let's dig down deep inside and find our honor and integrity and do what we know is right- not what we see Joe Schmoe at the corner bakery or on TV doing!

I agree! I wouldn't sell a character cake. It would just 'feel' wrong.

Excuse my ignorance, but I am confused. So the cake pans that Wilton sells in Michael's, you can't use those to bake, decorate & sell a cake? I also have an image printer and am I not allowed to print out a logo or picture of someone/thing that is famous and use that on a cake/cupcake? I need to do a Justin Bieber cake next week (as a donated cake for freecakesforkids.com). I was planning on printing out a picture of him on a frosting sheet and using that on the cake. Is that not allowed? Sorry for not understanding all this, as I am new.

A read that a lot of it depends on the company who holds the copyright and what type of copyright it is as there are many kinds.
But at the end of the day no amount of justification, no amount of convincing and no amount of side stepping will matter. If it is copyright protected then it is and the law dictates what is legal and illegal as per the copyright regardless of how someone thinks or feels it should be.

Wilton Character pans state on the label that they are for "home-use only". You cannot sell cakes made with these pans. And yes, photo copying any photo you did not take without permission is a copyright violation and more likely you will get caught if it is for sale.

Well, it's not necessarily theft if the company sells you the material to recreate the image. Making a MM cake out of gum paste and building a cake around it is clearly trademark infringement, however, making a cake in a character pan is different because disney sold you material of which the sole purpose is to recreate the their copyrighted image.

So here's where the problem is, for me anyway. If the latter is covered under the first sale doctrine, Disney and it's army of lawyers are fully aware of it,yet are able to sidestep the law by intimidating and harrassing the very people these items are being marketed to. They could just stop making the pans, but obviously it's less costly to keep a lawyer on retainer to shoot off threatening letters to anyone who might try to sell a cake that they made in a pan they paid for.

Now, to be clear, I'm not saying it's okay to steal someone's intellectual property, or that making cakes with a trademarked image a necessity to someone in the cake business. I'm only saying that questioning the validity and reach of a certain statement stamped on a certain cake pan doesn't necessarily make one morally bankrupt.

Btw, can anyone who owns one of these pans tell me exactly what the wording is? Does it just say "for home use only"?

I personally don't get the love affair with the Wilton Character pans anyway. Sorry, no offense intended. I am just amazed at the number of times that has come up in this thread. By the time people join this site, aren't they kind of past that level anyway? There is only 1 (maybe 2?) ways to decorate them. Where is the creativity in that? Where is the challenge? If you want to make them for your kids- have at it- that is exactly what they are for. Who would buy a cake like that anyway, when the materials are readily available to anyone and it takes very little skill. And, can anyone say "Carpal Tunnel Sydrome" ?

If you can zoom in, it says, "For home use only" on the lower right. It only says this on the character pans- not the more generic shapes like a race car or a cat.

The variety of opinions in this thread are interesting.

What if Wal-mart sells me an edible image to use on cake? Most stores won't do that, but the Wal-mart decorator told me 'we have the copy rights for everything'. How do I prove I bought it from Wal-mart and didn't copy it myself?? This is all very confusing. I can understand if I owned a bakery and was selling cakes like this.. I guess to be the most safe is to not do it at all, but that doesn't make it very fun for my niece who wanted a hello kitty cake. Am I in the wrong doing it for her? ugh.

If these pans are protected under the First Sale Doctrine(as are other Disney materials) then no, it is NOT theft. Disney cannot limit what you can do with it once they've sold it to you. They sell you the right to recreate the image when they sell you the pan, and if the FSD covers them, they have no say in whether you sell them or not.

And yes, if disney is so concerned about people profiting off of their image(because they can, legally under fsd if it applies) they could stop selling people materials for that purpose. They don't because trademark law is grey enough that people aren't sure what their rights are and can't afford the fight it. There is a lot of argument about disney's rights, but what about yours? Sure, not many people are using these pans professionally, but there are people here on this site, in this thread who are now afraid of having a picture of a cake that THEY MADE WITH A PAN THEY BOUGHT AND PAID FOR for their own children posted on the internet for fear of being harrassed by the trademark police. It's ridiculous.

It's possible that because one is producing an item from a trademarked material and the original material isn't part of the finished product(the image is part of the cake, but the pan is not) the fsd may not apply. But like every law, it is there for a reason and the consumer has every right to question it.

And thank you, cheatize for the pic. "For home use only" is kind of vague for such an important issue, imo. Maybe I read that and figure they just mean i have to bake the cake at home. Doesn't really say who's home or where I have to eat it or if I can sell it.

Back to what Debbie said: It's the pitting of the child against the parent.

For Home Use does not mean you can make it for profit. It means you can make it in your home for your use (whether it's for your child or for you to take to a friend's birthday party). There is to be no exchange of money.

For those who live in states where you can bake from home, you have to differentiate between personal use of your home and business use of your home. If you buy the pan for home use (which is stamped on the Wilton pans), then it is for your use for your "personal" use. You cannot use it for your business even if your business operates out of your house.

Paul

Charles Perault 1600's - Cinderella
The Brothers Grimm 1800s - Cinderella

Rudyard Kipling 1800s - The Jungle Book
Hans Cristian Anderson 1800s - The Little Mermaid
James M Barrie 1928 - Peter Pan.. The Lost Boys. Also creator of Tinkerbell, Captain Hook, e
Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, The Princess & the Frog all written by someone else a long time ago and adapted by Disney.

This is why I don't put much stock in this Disney copyright panic.

I doubt one Disney character is actually Disneys own creation other than Mickey Mouse. Even that may have been found elsewhere, who knows for sure. Sure Disney has altered most of the stories to have happy ending, unlike most of the originals. Same as the characters. They've been altered to look cute, pretty & handsome. Nonetheless, the stories, characters were all someone elses idea, their creation.
To me, that makes Disney just as guilty of the same copyright infringement that they are so he** bent on finding us and sueing us for.

I'm sure if you asked most children nowadays who created Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Peter Pan, The Little Mermaid etc, they would answer Disney, and thats a shame..

Just the other day I was looking for embroidery info. I came across a site that had photos of the persons embroidery creations with the word copyright all over the page with warnings galore about using the images.
I knew at first glance that many of the embroidery this person claimed to be her own idea had been taken from old quilts & embroidery patterns that my own grandmother used to make in the 50s. Sunbonnet Sue as one example. This person used the same old Sunbonnet Sue pattern I know where she is bent over with a watering can. The only change from the original pattern is this person added ruffle to the bonnet. Then she adds a copyright on her "creation". What hogwash.

My thoughts only... I believe every new idea, new design, new pattern, new character, has already been created by someone else in years gone past. We may think its our exclusive idea, exclusive design. But you can bet your bottom dollar we got the idea from seeing it elsewhere. Maybe in a slightly different form or whatever, but we still got the idea from someone else.

Sticking to the subject of images, the original characters of those books look SIGNIFICANTLY different that the ones Disney has created. I'm talking about the pictures, not the stories.

I don't know the history of copyright law, but it is still an example of "But Mom, what about..."

One may not agree with the law, it's still the law.

It's Disney's drawing that you'd be copying, though. The drawing is copyrighted whether people like it or not.