Most likely this has been answered before and if so I apologize I am thinking of wanting to get a few WOW themed tattoos mainly the Alliance and Horde symbols and am wondering being Blizzard’s IP do we need their permission to do so and if so how would we obtain it.
Thank you for any help.
I’d Think of it like a t-shirt. I don’t need permission to wear one with a wow symbol on it but the people who produce the shirts would need permission or a license to sell me one.
I would imagine the tattoo artist who makes money off of the sale of the intellectual property would need permission or a license, not the purchaser.
I have seen plenty of people with world of Warcraft tattoos, and I can’t picture Blizzard actually caring if you got one. Tho Nok might be right and it could depend on who is doing the tattoo, tho I’m sure the tattoo artist would let you know if you talked to them about it.
Thank you both for answers when I do have them done I will ask the guy who does it and see what he says.
Unless I am mistaken a wow tattoo is like a Scooby Doo tattoo, or Mickey Mouse, or Looney Toons, etc.
Technically speaking, it is protected material. Technically. I don’t see J Allen sicking his legal team on somebody that has say Alliance and Horde symbols as tattoos, much the same way you don’t see those with the above mentioned being pursued
Hope that makes sense.
Why would Blizzard sue you for free advertising? It isn’t like you’re selling their IP by auctioning off your skin.
“From a legal standpoint, tattooing a copyrighted image upon someone’s skin could cause issues down the road, but it’s not a likely occurrence. For the copyright holder to successfully pursue a lawsuit against an artist, the copyright holder would have to prove that the use of their image by the artist has negatively impacted their business by either devaluing their work or affecting the potential market where their work is used.”
"You “own” your tattoo in the sense that you have permanent physical possession of the design, seeing as it is displayed on your skin, but you do not own the actual rights to the design itself, and therefore cannot legally reproduce the image commercially, or use it to profiteer from in any way. Although this seems straight-forward, it can sometimes get confusing, especially for celebrities and prominent persons.
For example, if you’re planning on showing off your new tattoo on social media, or perhaps unveiling it on the red carpet, this falls under an acceptable display of the tattoo, but if you are using the tattoos imagery to promote a product, or if you have separated the tattoo from the skin and are using it as an independent design, this would likely be deemed as copyright infringement. "
Highly unlikely it would ever be an issue.
There are well known streamers who have WoW tattoos, they’ve been displayed prominently on their Twitter, Insta and even stream. They’ve been at Blizzard events, stood next to Blizzard employees… not a single one of them has been sued or legally forced to cover up the tattoo.
The average Joe who wants to get a simple
WoW themed tattoo because they’re a fan of the game is so low on the totem pole for Blizzard’s legal team, especially considering the average Joe isn’t looking to profit off the original design, it’s just a tattoo to commemorate their love of the game.
The Horde and Alliance Symbols are Blizzard’s Intellectual Property, and as such, use of said artwork requires permission.
The tattoo artist must get permission to use the symbols just like everyone else who uses it on T-shirts, coffee mugs, posters, et al. Whether Blizzard chooses to go after offenders or not is their decision, but legally they have the right to do so.
So in a nutshell, only the person producing the product with said symbol is subject to legal action.
Look at it this way, Peloton had to remove a lot of their previously recorded spin classes because of copyright infringements due to the instructors choice of music during the session. Streamers have had to remove content as well for very much the same reasons.
Reality is, just because an image is out there on the internet doesn’t mean it’s free from copyright. In fact, there are probably far more copyright infringements going on than you can shake a stick at. The fact that no one has bothered to go after said infringements to date does not preclude the possibility of it happening down the road.
And for the record, legally they can shut down any use of the image at any time for any reason. They own the image. Most people are woefully misinformed about copyrights. You want to know what a copyright is, go straight to the horse’s mouth, the US Copyright Office.
http-s://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-definitions.html
And again, Blizzards legal team is not really hunting down regular everyday people who get a WoW themed tattoo, or the artist that did the tattoo. They have the right to do so, but again, there are millions of people out there, and millions of tattoo artists… do you really think Blizzards legal team is wasting time hunting these people down to pursue legal action? Read the article linked above, I quoted a couple of parts that clarify it a bit… no massive company is going on a manhunt for some little town guy who gets a tattoo of something for his own enjoyment.
Thank you to all who replied it does ease my mind that when I get these done Blizzard won’t care consider it free advertising for the game.