Gibson hits Trump Guitars with cease and desist for resemblance to Les Paul body design : guitars

[–] [email protected] 52 points 4 days ago (2 children)

As much as I dislike Orange Man, and would like to praise Gibson here, this probably doesn't have much, if anything, to do with politics.. Gibson has spent the last decade suing fucking everybody over IP infringement. They're particularly fond of going after small independent luthiers who don't have the means to fight a giant corporation in court.

It's part of Gibson's multi-decade plan to cary out any wacky dumbass scheme they can think of to boost profits, just so long as it doesn't involve them making high quality instruments again.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 4 days ago

They're particularly fond of going after small independent luthiers who don't have the means to fight a giant corporation in court.

You have to vigorously defend trademarks or you lose them.

https://www.musicradar.com/news/guitars/fender-loses-guitar-copyright-case-201886

[–] [email protected] 12 points 4 days ago

I don't know what Gibson is so upset about, those guitars are representative of what Gibson is all about. Overpriced garbage that's likely to break.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Just like his dropshipped sneakers and watches the trump guitars website has the disclaimer "The images shown are for illustration purposes only and may not be an exact representation of the product", so they'll probably be ok to just send different looking junk from Ali other than the Gibson-looking junk.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 days ago

Temu drop shipped

[–] charade_you_are 9 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Fuck, he even infests guitars

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 days ago

And here I thought my one little corner of the internet was safe from bullshit, and Hitler has to go make a guitar. Go figure

[–] [email protected] 31 points 4 days ago (1 children)

die already

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Every time somebody wishes death to that bastard Satan adds another day to his life.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago

Damn, this guy's going to live a thousand years.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 days ago (1 children)

So if we wish him well, will Satan take away days?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 days ago (2 children)

No, where do you think Satan gets the extra days from?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Where?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Penis to penis or get the fuck out

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I'm so confused.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

My bad, I thought you were responding to the touche response.

Touche means touch, so if you're going to touch it has to be penis to penis obviously.

To answer your actual question, the extra days of life come from dampnuts followers, channeled through misplaced worship to the dark lord into his life reservoir.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

Touche

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Do any trumpers actually know how to play a guitar, or is this just another cheap Chinese prop?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Unfortunately, yes, just like any other niche. I have distanced myself from a few musician friends because they absolutely cannot resist injecting incredibly toxic politics into every aspect of their lives. Vote for whoever you want, but every conversation is not an invitation to blather on about the talking points of the week.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Vote for whoever you want

Don't vote for literal fascists, though

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

I mean, yeah obviously, but the kind of person I'm talking about isn't going to listen to me telling them why they shouldn't. Given that, the best we can hope for is not talking about it.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 days ago

"Can't stop the king." -Potato Supreme

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Someone is making Trump guitars now

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Opportunistic businessmen capitalizing on the stupidity of his supporters. It's almost commendable as a business venture.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 days ago

At this rate we're going to have an entire old school catalog of Trump shit by the end of the first year. Fucking press conferences to hock his grifty shit.

Trump vodka is back

Get the exclusive Trump Cyber truck by Tesla.

Wipe like a President with Trump toilet paper.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago (2 children)

I'm not trying to defend Trump in any way, but seeing the crap he's trying to sell to dumb people, the last thing I think is "that sure looks like a prestige Les Paul"

[–] [email protected] 16 points 4 days ago (3 children)

I've heard it's not Trump himself selling them just one of his dickriders with his backing.

I normally don't side with Gibson over their stupid copyright claims for pretty generic shapes. But if they can knock some Trumpster down a peg I'll back them this time.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 4 days ago

I've heard it's not Trump himself selling them just one of his dickriders with his backing.

That's Trump's entire business model.

He didn't write the Trump Bible himself.

[–] captain_aggravated 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I don't think anything about a guitar besides maybe artwork printed on the face should be copyrightable.

Features of a guitar may be patentable. New and novel features might qualify for a utility patent, aka "Method and apparatus for pitch bending guitar strings via an articulated bridge." These would have to have functional ramifications to the guitar or represent a new way of making them. The spring-loaded bridge with tremolo handle would qualify for utility patent, I think Ovation's plastic round backs and maybe their clusters of small tone holes would also. Utility patents last for 20 years and all that I've mentioned would have expired by now.

There are also design patents, which is, for the most part, what I think the distinctive shape of a guitar body would fall under. Design patent covers the aesthetic shape of a functional object. The Stratocaster, the Les Paul, the Flying V, the distinctive body shapes of these guitars would qualify for design patent. Design patents last 15 years in the US so all of these designs would have long since expired into the public domain.

Then we get into trademark, which is different from copyrights and patents. Trademarks guarantee the source of goods, and are thus valid as long as you're in business. The names Les Paul, Stratocaster, Breadwinner, etc. Those names can be trademarked. In the guitar world, I would also allow trademarking the shape of headstocks, because while there are practical constraints head stock embellishments are largely non-functional and decorative. The headstock shape of a guitar is notionally similar to the hood ornament or radiator grille of a car. I give Fender right-of-way on their distinctive wedge with circle on the end shape and Ovation their Londo Mollari frill.

If we allow luthiers to trademark the overall shape of a guitar, we're stifling innovation. The entire reason patents expire is so that - after the inventor got his cut - anyone else can go "I can make it better and/or cheaper." Allowing the entire design to be trademarked in perpetuity is subverting the spirit of the law. It allows mostly businessmen who don't actually create anything to gather up and hoard intellectual property like a dragon hoards treasure, profiting from something they had no hand in creating like an intellectual tape worm. The inventions of 60 years ago must now be the heritage of all mankind else we risk allowing the rot of private equity to spread.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Features of a guitar may be patentable.

The entire design is a feature. Take the strat. None of it was accidental or using existing common features when it was designed. I don't particularly like the look of the design, but I can respect that every inch of it has a purpose. My favorite part of a strat is the shape on the bottom back which isn't even visible but makes it comfortable to play in a sitting position or while moving around in a standing position without hitting a sharp edge. The same applies the front top which allows you to rest your lower arm on the body without hitting a sharp edge. The cut aways are self-explanatory but keeping the horns also serves a purpose of balancing the weight and also makes it possible to rest on a leg when sitting. The headstock is ugly big, but it is necessary for the weight distribution.

Both Gibson and Fender had issues with their headstocks. The 3rd. string always goes out of tune before the other strings, because of the distance between the tuners and the nut. Notice the fix by Fender placing a lock on 1st & 2nd strings, otherwise those would be even worse. Musicman solved that by designing a headstock that is even uglier, but actually works by minimizing the distance. They rightfully patented that solution.

The Les Paul design has none of that, obviously because it came first, but also because it's designed for something else completely: Sustain. The entire purpose of the LP design was to make a long, clean and loud tone.

Copying that and slapping a MAGA sticker on it is a fucking disgrace to everything called guitar design. Nobody serious about guitar design gives a fuck about the colour or visual appeal. It'd be even worse if it was the visual aesthetic that was patentable. I'd definitely call dibs on an all black guitar then or the manga shit that everyone is sporting right now. In my opinion that is hardly worthy of copyright.

[–] captain_aggravated 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Nobody serious about guitar design gives a fuck about the colour or visual appeal

Explain the Flying V.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

The Flying V was Gibson's reaction to the Fender Stratocaster, which was the first electric guitar to break away from the standard hour glass shaped body used for pretty much all string instruments until then. Gibson wanted in on this evolution and chose to go all in with the 3 futuristic shapes Flying V, Explorer and Moderna, while still maintaining the neck-through from the Les Paul and sharply angled headstock.

They did some improvements to the tuner locations on the headstock and made the upper frets accessible by the body shape instead of simply copying Fenders cut aways.

However, all 3 designs failed completely at the time, selling less than 100 pcs. They were too unconventional for the intended market of jazz and blues players, which already had a preference for other Gibson models like the ES series. It didn't really offer anything that didn't already exist. Gibson learned the hard way that the spacey design was not the reason for Fenders success. It was all about the comfort. Gibson later made the SG to address this.

It wasn't until the 1980s that heavy rock guitarists embraced the radical shapes, which was absolutely for looks. Hendrix made a notable live appearances using the V prior to that, but it's well known that he primarily recorded using a Stratocaster. I'd guess he used it live because of the humbuckers being better for that.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago

I think the case has a pretty solid backing though. Gibson has made a more or less identical guitar for 100 years, same with Les Paul, Statocasters, and pretty much all guitar manufacturers. You could argue it's predatory from the largest guitar manufacturer, but they will probably win.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

Oh look, it's two horrible people fighting eachother. Nobody wins, but it's still good entertainment.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Do they have a legal leg to stand on? Plenty of brands sell guitars similar or identical to Les Pauls, Strats, SGs...

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 days ago

There is some precedence with design similarities.

Gibson went after Ibanez in the late 70's for the headstock.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

So Gibson is the Nintendo of instruments?

That have sense with the fact what all Japanese have a hyperfixation with Les Pauls.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Related anecdote, my sister's fiance (at the time) gave me a guitar he supposedly found by a dumpster or in a storage unit. It looked like a Les Paul, but wasn't, I forget the name on the top. I sent it to have it looked over and a couple little things repaired.

The repair guy ended up calling me and making sure I was good with XYZ, and I asked if he could tell me anything about it. Apparently, I had a Japanese counterfeit Les Paul. I guess back in the 70s/80s/90s, Japanese companies would make clones of Les Paul's and sell them for a reduced price, but their quality was kinda comparable to the real deal.

Les Paul would sue and/or send a cease and desist, and the company would shut down and pop up a few months later under a different name, rinse and repeat.

I ended up selling the guitar back in high school, kinda wish I hadn't, but actually ended up buying another a few years later, different color but a Japanese Les Paul.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago

I really want to know why jp have a fixation with lespauls. The 90% of animes that had a character playing music use one.