Gibson vs. Tokai

[Accept2]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

Well said Grandturk, if Tokai was really a great builder they would be successful with their own designs, but no matter how they try they can never make an original guitar that someone would actually buy..........

[Sephiroth]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

Isn't the LP based on an early acoustic-electric by Gretch?

Didn't Gibson copy Jackson once with the Epihone demon?

[Jim Shine]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

People love to bring up how Fender 'ripped off' Bigsby's headstock for the Strat. Well, the body of a Bigsby Merele Travis model looked as similar to a Les Paul in outline as the head looked like a Strat.

[etaeniura]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

I don't care how many companies Gibson sues-I can't see dropping 1100 bucks on an LP Studio, much less 1800 for a "Standard". No one who knows anything about guitars is going to confuse anything with a real GIbson. Are they hoping to stop the impulse buyers from buying the competition on a leisurely stroll through the music store? Maybe the people who work for GIbson can arbitrarily drop a few grand on a new guitar at any gven moment, but real people take their time to really check out guitars before they blow that kind of money. Maybe Gibson is worried about the competition becuase their quality control is slacking? People drop 2 grand on a guitar because it is supposed to have that "made in the USA" personal attention to detail and be flawless, but why do it when you can get pretty damn close for 500?

[ApeDosMil]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

well said etaeniura!

[Sephiroth]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

[ QUOTE ]
I don't care how many companies Gibson sues-I can't see dropping 1100 bucks on an LP Studio, much less 1800 for a "Standard". No one who knows anything about guitars is going to confuse anything with a real GIbson. Are they hoping to stop the impulse buyers from buying the competition on a leisurely stroll through the music store? Maybe the people who work for GIbson can arbitrarily drop a few grand on a new guitar at any gven moment, but real people take their time to really check out guitars before they blow that kind of money. Maybe Gibson is worried about the competition becuase their quality control is slacking? People drop 2 grand on a guitar because it is supposed to have that "made in the USA" personal attention to detail and be flawless, but why do it when you can get pretty damn close for 500?

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree that was well-said.

...not to forget kids just starting out who can't afford even an ephiphone, or for whom's parents refuse to commit more than a couple of hundred $$$'s for something that may just be a phase.

[YetAnotherOne]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

[ QUOTE ]
No one who knows anything about guitars is going to confuse anything with a real GIbson. Are they hoping to stop the impulse buyers from buying the competition on a leisurely stroll through the music store?

[/ QUOTE ]

You might not be too far off there. The standard is "liklihood of confusion" by a sufficient portion of the relevant consumers. These things often turn on getting a proper definition of who the relevant consumers are. The norm is for the parties to present evidence in the form of surveys of a sample of consumers drawn from that relevant portion either showing or failing to show confusion. The upshot is that these decisions are rarely made by some wild-eyed judge or a dopey jury who's been duped by a slick lawyer, they're usually the result of the relevant consumers actually being confused (at least when they were surveyed).

[pro-fusion]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

That's the problem with the PRS lawsuit, however. There WASN'T any such survey that showed confusion in any form, or even the potential for confusion. The decision literally came down to the judge eyeballing the instruments himself, if I read the article correctly. In this case, it appears that the decision to put an entire industry (guitar craft-builders) on the brink of disaster was made by a wild-eyed judge in the home territory of a large local employer. I predict the appeals court throws this one out.

The Tokai thing is entirely different. Those guitars are *exact copies* of a Les Paul, and Gibson is entirely within its legal rights to stop Tokai from doing that. After the whole early '80s Fender lawsuit thing against the Japanese builders, I'm rather surprised that Tokai was attempting to set up U.S. distribution for its copy guitars again. They should have known a lawsuit would be the result.

[adrenaline junkie]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

If you read the article about the PRS Suit, I think you'd have found that the most damning facts, were Paul Reed Smith himself, in a memo, stated that they were going after Gibson, and the Les Paul Market. Couple that with the rest of the info, and they won.

[YetAnotherOne]

Re: Gibson vs. Tokai

[ QUOTE ]
That's the problem with the PRS lawsuit, however. There WASN'T any such survey that showed confusion in any form, or even the potential for confusion. The decision literally came down to the judge eyeballing the instruments himself, if I read the article correctly. In this case, it appears that the decision to put an entire industry (guitar craft-builders) on the brink of disaster was made by a wild-eyed judge in the home territory of a large local employer. I predict the appeals court throws this one out.

[/ QUOTE ]

If there were no other evidence presented, the judge would eyeball the drawing from Gibson's trademark registration as well as the instruments. Here's the (awful reproduction of the) drawing from the PTO database:



Gibson claimed a mark that, "... consists of a uniquely shaped configuration for the body portion of the guitar as illustrated in the drawing by the solid lines. The lining of the drawing is not inteded to indicate color."

You're the judge, can you seriously differentiate the contours of the outline above from the outline of this body:



I can't, at least not in a significant way. PRS may win on appeal but I don't think the judge was egregiously out of bounds here.

The folks who dropped the ball are Gibson's competitors who didn't challenge the registration: 1) when it was filed in '87, 2) during the years required before secondary meaning attached & registration on the principle register was possible, 3) when it was published for opposition in '93, 4) before Gibson filed their affidavit of incontestability. There's a minimum of a decade there when challenges would have been much easier than they are today but Gibson's competitors apparently didn't feel like taking up the challenge. Bravo to Gibson for being the superior competitor and playing the game well enough to secure rights in what are unquestionably their own design. What's wrong with that?

[PowerTube]

But....

I see one major pitfall with this. How many players will always keep going back to their "first love?" I would say quite a few. Most kids who start on a Strat copy will always have a fondness for Strats. Likewise with the Les Paul copies. They had better hope that Epiphone does well. If Gibson sues everone in sight who makes a cheaper Les Paul copy, then guess what? Kids will grow up playing Strat styles and others and never look back.

[adrenaline junkie]

Re: But....

[ QUOTE ]
I see one major pitfall with this. How many players will always keep going back to their "first love?" I would say quite a few. Most kids who start on a Strat copy will always have a fondness for Strats. Likewise with the Les Paul copies. They had better hope that Epiphone does well. If Gibson sues everone in sight who makes a cheaper Les Paul copy, then guess what? Kids will grow up playing Strat styles and others and never look back.

[/ QUOTE ]

There's one major pitfall with that line of thinking too. If you can afford to buy a PRS Single cut for little Johnny when he's 12, you can afford a Gibson.

They haven't sued anyone other than PRS up to date. They sent a letter to Rondo, about the Agile's, and they changed them to get away. The Tokais, are EXACT copies!