The Dodge Challenger Message Board

On the 28th of this month, the engineering drawings at this link will be going away;

http://www.hamtramck-historical.com/pho ... Menu.shtml

One of the Chrysler LLC employees that works in Chrysler Brand Protection has notified me that these drawings are copyrighted and owned by Chrysler LLC. He has asked me to remove them from my site before the 29th of this month, and I have told him that I will comply.

Several people have worked very hard to scan these and make them available for all to see, I was quite happy to provide a venue for that. I mentioned to him that I would hate to see these "go away" forever, so I offered to send him all the scans I have of them if they could be hosted on the Chrysler Heritage website.

His response;

"Thank you for the offer to provide us copies of the prints although it will not be necessary."

This is where the good new comes in! This is another direct quote from him;

"To give you more insight, the reason for my request is that the Chrysler Heritage website is preparing to display these on their site (I don't have timing)."

I of course have asked for more details. I am sincerely hoping that they have other drawings that we did not have on the HH site. Time will tell of course, but I sure hope so!

I have asked him to keep me in the loop and let me know when the engineering drawings on their site go live. I will post an update when one is available.

Barry Washington

He could be telling fibs.

I have a feeling that these guys do not actually work for Chrysler. Most motor manufacturers contract out these pen pushers to search out any copyright infringments in the media etc.

They are probably on commission or something because some websites (like one of the Ford owners sites) have been told that any image of a Ford product is owned by Ford and cannot be used. They say this includes any images of Ford products regardless of who took the photo.

Years ago there were a few Mopar websites told they could not use the Mopar logo and had to remove it. Yet have you ever actually heard of anyone being taken to court for it?
I used to use the Mopar logo for my background on my website. No one ever threatened me with legal action and I doubt there is anything that would actually stand up in court. It is all Bull.

Galen Glovier used to threaten people with court action because he claimed production numbers were his property because he worked the numbers out originally.

Barry. I would have seriously told this guy to get stuffed. When are these anal bastards going to realise that you CANNOT copyright the internet.

What would stop me from downloading your images and putting them on my website?
I will tell you. NOTHING. There is absolutely nothing they can do about it.

Barry. Don't do it.

If you want I can put the drawing images on here and you can link directly to them so that the images look as if they are on your website still. If you do not have possession of the images how can they take you to court?
These legal guys are complete bullshitters.

If any images (including scans of drawings) are on various websites around the world then they are free to access.

If Chrysler put these same drawings on their own website they will just get copied by everyone and put on websites everywhere. You cannot control the internet.

Sounds good to me Dave..I second that motion Barry, I would call their bluff and see if they send you anything like a letter stating who they represent and what you have done wrong.

Your love for these machines have kept all of this precious information alive.

Dave are you taking the piss mate ..Did GG really try that abou the production numbers thing what a tit!!!

Barry, I am with Dave on this issue. The Indianapolis Motor Speedway tried to do this to our club name. They claimed to own the name Indy. We did not back down and we are still called the Indy Mopar club.

Carol Shelby is trying the same thing with the 35 year old SAAC.

Bob

The guy will be some youngster trying to make a name for himself on his legal team. I would bet money on him not working directly for Chrysler but the practice will be trying to justify the cost of its contract with them.

The UK law states that copyright is not an issue if parts of the material is being used for educational purposes and you are also OK to download this material to save for your own use onto your own computer. They show films and TV shows to the students here as part of their education all the time.

It also mentions "Copies and lending by librarians". You could argue that Barry is a librarian.

I think if Barry was charging people for the use of the drawings (i.e. making money from them) he would be breaking copyright and in the wrong.

Like the guy selling Mopar T-shirts at the US Nats that got stopped.

But as it is I can't see it being against the law to view images that are going to be in the public domain anyway?

US law is similar;

It is not an infringement of copyright to make short quotations from a work for purposes of criticism, comment, teaching, scholarship, or research. 17 USC §107. However, every quotation must be clearly identified with the name of the author and the source of the quotation. The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, Article 10(3), which is implemented in national laws of many countries. Suitable forms for identification of author and source are contained in academic style manuals (e.g., The Chicago Manual of Style), in the rules for footnotes or bibliographic citations.

The fair use statute, 17 USC §107, says:
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.

http://www.rbs2.com/copyr.htm

Thanks to Neil for that link. Just in case his link is copyright because he typed it out.

I say M'Lurd!! You must be one of them fancy law folk Robbo!!

Well I have to admit I have been in court quite a few times over the years. But only ever in the dock.

Arguably, this is all fair use of old material (for which there was usually no copyright application in the first place, that is the case for old shop manuals).

I can not read enough details in the lower-right hand corner of your scans to make sure, but I don't see anything looking like a copyright or a disclosure notice.
So, should any legal action be taken, the first step would most likely be to establish the copyrights. There's no copyright infringement without copyright. Several commercial outlets reproduce entire shop manuals without paying any royalties to Chrysler (some even claim to have a copyright agreement with Mopar to make sure customers don't copy and redistribute their poorly assembled, unindexed low-quality scans...)

I doubt Chrysler would take Mopar enthusiasts to court for material :
- for which there is clearly little or no market value (unless I misunderstand CH's intentions),
- that does not pertain to any vehicles currently in production,
- that is very relevant, and even vital, to all enthusiasts who need this information to correctly rebuild their cars.
- that is not made currently available by Chrysler (although that is apparently scheduled to change).

Hundreds of people have already downloaded these (although it would be easier if you had zips of the scans , backing them up one at a time is rather tedious).


If I was in your situation, I would try to argue that my copies will remain available to the public until Chrysler Heritage's become available, and will be taken out once you have made sure that CH's version does indeed provide at least the same level of detail and useful information (currently, the CH website contains exactly ZERO useful car restoration-related information).

Did he mention whether the drawings would be made available for free or not (I have horror visions of only a handful of these drawings, sold as posters at the CH gift shop)?

I'd be curious to know whether MyMopar.com, Allpar, and all the others have received similar threats/requests.

fbernard wrote:If I was in your situation, I would try to argue that my copies will remain available to the public until Chrysler Heritage's become available, and will be taken out once you have made sure that CH's version does indeed provide at least the same level of detail and useful information (currently, the CH website contains exactly ZERO useful car restoration-related information).

Absolutely.