Can I make band merch and sell it?
If you're going to use nationally and internationally popular bands you will probably get into trouble with copyright infringement. Check out your local musicians and ask them if they would like some merchandise made for them. You could work out a deal with them where you share the profit.
To what extent is creating and selling band merch illegal?
1. "No copyright infringement intended" would not get you off the hook. That's like saying to Uncle Norman, "You are an idiot and you smell bad. No offense intended." You are obviously infringing the copyright, so don't. 2. "Free" still cuts into the sales of official merchandise, and therefore of their share of the income that their hard work and artistic talent made possible. 3/Additional: I would suggest contacting their label's permissions department to find out the terms and conditions (including payment of licensing fees) for producing and/or selling official merchandise. There is a right way to do this! Good luck!
Is making a t-shirt for personal use that uses a copyrighted image legal?
As many others have already made clear, of course this would be illegal. You don’t own the rights to the band’s logo and imagery, so you can’t distribute them without their permission.Don’t even kid yourself with the “personal use” premise. It’s not. You’d have to submit that design to a t-shirt vendor and ask them to reproduce it; that’s distribution. And if you ever wear it in public, that’s distribution, too (which you don’t have the legal right to do). And even if you have your own t-shirt making equipment in your home and you’ll never wear it out in public, there’s still no exception in copyright law for personal use (it’s just that nobody will see or know about the infringement).But why not ASK the band’s promoter? Seriously, if you’re wanting t-shirts, surely you’re not the only one. You could identify a specific logo, image, or album cover you want to use and ask permission to make a t-shirt for yourself with that on it. And if they grant that permission, you don’t have to worry about copyright or trademark infringement.Who knows? It could turn out that they’ve wanted all along to have t-shirt merchandise made and they just didn’t have someone with the time or skills to coordinate getting that done. Perhaps they’ll appreciate the interest and partner with you to produce them. Or maybe they’ve already got shirts in the works. Or maybe they’ll say they have no plans to produce any, but you’re welcome to make one.Every which way I can think of, your situation is enhanced by seeking permission.
How can you sell band merchandise without getting in trouble for copyright?
I see people on Etsy and EBay do it all the time. They sell Nirvana shirts with the famous smiley logo and One direction tees with there faces on them(by the quantity so it's not like they bought one T-shirt and resell it as a used item) . How do they not get in trouble? Will I get in trouble if I start selling band merch?
Is designing and selling unofficial band merchandise illegal? Why or why not?
Going anonymous here to protect my husband.My husband owns the copyright to his band’s name and logo. When we were engaged/ first married, I traveled with the band. I sold official band merchandise.One day, we were out on a golf course with one of his best friends. They had been friends for 30 years. He commented about how fun it must be to go on the road, and he wanted to come.He drove in his own car and paid for his own hotels. However, I could never find him during the shows or afterward.One day, a venue that was taking a particularly high cut of the merch sales came up to me to complain that the band was undercutting their percentage by selling t shirts in the parking lot as well.I commented that we were doing no such thing.Turns out, my husband's former friend had made up t shirts of his own and was selling them out of the trunk of his car. He said he had to do it to finance coming on the road with us. We were selling for $20, making $8 per shirt (after materials, printing and shipping costs.) and this venue was taking $4 per shirt (20%). So, we were making just $4 profit per shirt and this guy is selling shirts for $10, undercutting us, and claiming it was official band merchandise. The shirts were ugly and of low quality.I had been wondering why sales were down that tour…So, since he was my husband's friend, they just are not friends anymore. He lost a great friendship.I tell you something else…if that were just some random guy, my husband's lawyer would have sued his ass off, and there would definitely be some sort of cease and desist order.Merch is the band’s profit. Gig fees pay crew, bus, bus driver, hotels, breakfast (if it isnt free in the hotel) and meals on travel (non - gigging) days.So, just DON’T BE THAT GUY.
How are so many websites selling unlicensed merchandise?
While I don’t know about 642Stitches and other sites you mentioned, the bigger sites like Amazon and ebay have reporting mechanisms for alerting the management regarding possible copyright and trademark infringement issues (Amazon.com - Report Infringement and Reporting intellectual property infringements (VeRO), for example).The responsibility for policing of potential trademark infringement generally fall to the owner of the trademark, so it may be that the sites you’d mentioned haven’t been found yet. There are a variety of trademark monitoring services available, and the bigger brands do use these services or have their own personnel/software for monitoring their own brands. [I have a friend who had a job monitoring trademarks for one of these service providers — it sounds like the ideal job if you just want to Internet surf all day!]Hope this helps.
A friend of mine has been making vinyl car stickers of bands I like and I've put a couple on my car. Does anyone know if this violates copyright protection?
Yes, it’s extremely likely that your friend is infringing on the copyright of the bands. The only exception would be if your friend is careful not to use any copyrighted images when creating the stickers (the band’s name can be trademarked but not copyrighted, but images can be copyrighted), or if the band has explicitly given permission to use the images, released the images with a permissive open source license, or explicitly released the images into the public domain.Does the band care about what your friend is doing? Maybe, maybe not. Some bands encourage fan-made stuff, even when sold. Others don’t and try to protect their copyrights.Does anyone, including the band, their label, the police, or randos on the internet care what you are doing by putting the stickers on your car? No. Nobody cares about that. While your friend might have some exposure by violating a band’s copyright, you have none.