Lego Loses Its Unique Right To Make Lego Blocks 576
tsa writes "The European Department of Justice has decided that the Danish company Lego does not have exclusive rights to the lego building block anymore (sorry, it's in Dutch). Lego went to court after a Canadian firm had made blocks that were so like lego blocks that they even fit the real blocks made by Lego. The European judge decided that the design of the lego blocks is not protected by European trademarks and so anyone can make the blocks." If true, hopefully this will open doors for people interested in inexpensive bulk purchase of bricks of specific sizes and colors. Perhaps at long last I can build a life-sized Hemos statue for my office.
English translation (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Cheap = Good for parents (Score:5, Informative)
We bought some Mega Bloks for our son, but the plastic they used (polypropylene?) is too soft to keep a good grip. Duplos are made out of ABS plastic that holds its shape much better, so the blocks stay locked and structures stay together. We can't even build a simple staircase out of Mega Bloks without frustration. Constructions have to have twice as many Mega Bloks as Duplos to have the same strength.
While though the Mega Bloks are cheaper, we'll probably stick to Duplo and Lego for the future.
Re:makes sense (Score:3, Informative)
Lego had stepped to the European Court of Justice in the fight against the Canadian competitor Mega fire, which a cube on the market has brought that watches out which of Lego. The court judged today that the design of Lego has not been protected by the European merkenrecht and that there can no talk be therefore of exclusive right.
From the babelfish
Re:Cheap = Good for parents (Score:5, Informative)
I agree. Mega blocks are crap.
We picked up a huge bin at a garage sale last summer. Most of it was Lego, but there was just enough Mega Blocks to frustrate you. They don't fit right, they don't hold very good, and the colours suck.
I am a big fan of competition. Hopefully this drives down the price of real legos.
If they lost the trademark though, Mega Blocks can start marketing their product as lego. That would suck.
I thought (Score:5, Informative)
If true, hopefully this will open doors for people interested in inexpensive bulk purchase of bricks of specific sizes and colors.
I thought you could already do that. [lego.com]
Re:ISO Standard (Score:5, Informative)
It's actually damn hard to make the bricks. Lego found this out when they outsourced production a few years ago. It turned out to be a bad deal both for Flextronics and Lego, so now the factories are all back under direct Lego management.
Lego didn't invent them in the first place (Score:5, Informative)
After Hilary Page commited suicide, LEGO purchased the expired patents from Page's estate so they could pretend they invented them in the first place.
LEGO did invent and patent the little tube on the bottom of the brick, which wasn't in Page's original design, which allows for more connection possibilities. Once that patent expired, other companies, such as Canada's MEGA, (creator of Mega Bloks) created clones. LEGO, of course, sued for trademark infringement. In the US, they lost, because you can't trademark and patent the same things - functional elements, which are covered by patents, can't be trademarked. Other countries treat this issue differently, hence LEGO enjoys some trademark protection even for the purely functional elements.
Apparently, LEGO's view is that a patent should be valid as long as the company holding the patent continues to manufacture the product, and tends to be pretty aggressive about it. The irony they they effectively violated the patents of the original inventor is completely lost on them.
Posting anonymously because I've had previous run-ins with LEGO's lawyers.
Translation (Score:5, Informative)
Lego loses it's unique right to make Lego blocks
Luxemburg - It'll be hard to swallow for the Danish manufacturer Lego now that the European Court of Justice has decided Wednesday that everyone can make a block that fits the original legoblock.
Lego had gone to the European Court of Justice battling against the Canadian competitor Mega Brands, who has brought a block on the market that fits Lego's. The Court ruled today that the design of Lego is not protected by European trademark and that there can be no such thing as an unique right.
The Lego block was invented in 1932 by Ole Kirk Christiansen in the Danish city Billund. The name LEGO is derived from the Danish words "LE GOdt" (play good). Later the word appeared the word could be interpreted in Latin as "I gather" (or 'I choose' or 'I read').
LEGO is a Danish toy manufacturer that became famous because of the colored plastic blocks. The blocks are sold under the name "Lego"; that way they refer not only to the manufacturer, but it also became a generic brand. The manufacturer is the biggest toy manufacturer in Europe with a revenue of 7823 billion Danish Krone ( 1049 billion Euro or 1337 billion dollars ) in 2006. Meanwhile, LEGO has won the price "Toy of the Century" twice.
The LEGO Group is the fifth biggest toy manufacturer in the world.
This story is completely wrong. (Score:5, Informative)
Lego hasn't had a monopoly on the bricks for decades. (They have a monopoly on making bricks that actually work, but that's not for legal reasons, that's just because their competitors are incompetent.)
Lego has used a red 2x4 Lego brick in advertisements, and they believed that this particular brick could be used as a trademarked "logo". The European Department of Justice decided that the brick picture is too generic to be trademarked. The decision will be appealed.
So all it means is that competitors are allowed to put that particular brick in their advertisements and on their boxes. They already had the right to produce the brick.
Re:Cheap = Good for parents (Score:3, Informative)
If these points are still true concerning both companies, then I am still willing to pay for a bin of $100 LEGO because they are the superior product. (Granted, I'm sure the $20 to $100 difference is exaggerated).
On a related note, most of my LEGO are still in good shape, so I can just mix in my old blocks with my kids' new blocks, and voila, a cheaper alternative to buying whole new buckets.
Re:Cheap = Good for parents (Score:5, Informative)
We picked up a huge bin at a garage sale last summer. "
Older Mega blocks are crap. Mega Blocks produced in recent years are just as mechanically good as Lego, and after this decision might start looking as good too.
Lego has had various varieties of legal protections on their blocks in various countries. They had some patents on elements of their production process that prevented others from making good blocks cheap; hence the crappy Mega Blocks. Those patents expired a while ago, so MegaBlocks became good.
Lego still had a trademarks in various countries on the look of the iconic red brick. Hence the different colour scheme you don't like. That trademark is now gone, so expect Mega Blocks to start looking nice.
Lego still has, and presumably always will have, a trademark on the name "Lego". So they'll continue to benefit from their (well deserved) reputation for quality, and charge more for their bricks. But MegaBlocks might, now, be just as good.
Re:makes sense (Score:2, Informative)
Lego was to the European Court of Justice and were active in the fight against the Canadian competitor Mega Brands, which is a block on the market that fits that of Lego. The Court ruled today that the design of Lego is not protected by the trademark and that there should be no question of monopoly.
Ubiquity translate command - get with the times
Re:Cheap = Good for parents (Score:3, Informative)
I notice in your other post, you mention Duplo: one of Lego's oversize, toddler-frienly lines. MegaBloks also makes some over-size toddler blocks, but I don't know if they have a specific name for them. My experience with those is that Duplo blocks hold together better, but are harder for little, poorly coordinated hands to stick together. So I take that to be an intentionally different design decision.
In any case, the trademark decision at hand, and my post, is not about the toddler blocks. It's about the little blocks, which Lego calls "Lego" and MegaBloks confusingly just calls "MegaBloks" too. For those, MegaBloks are just a direct knockoff of Legos. In my judgment, a mechanically indistinguishable one in recent years.
Lego can't compete (Score:5, Informative)
The problem is, Lego might be a household name, indeed in some countries it is a generic name for building blocks, but it is still a family-owned business. It's CEO and Chairman is a cool-looking grandson of the founder, and it resides in a rural town in Denmark called Billund, with a population of about 27,000 where nearly 90% of its manufacturing still occurs. The town is almost entirely dependent on Lego.
Lego is among the world's best employers (if not outright best). Equal opportunity in action. Employees, including the CEO, do not have reserved parking spots at the HQ's carpark, offices mostly resemble community areas rather than walled rooms, free food and drinks are all over the place, not to mention some of the best sporting and health facilities provided to employees. Blue collar workers receive the same treatment, for most things from gym membership to access to the health clinic, there is no difference between the executives and simple manufacturing employee. People don't wear name tags, they nearly always wear casual, unless they have a meeting with an outside party.
Lego has Idea Labs where people just experiment with new toys. It employs scientist, from chemists to child psychologists just to carry out all sorts of experiments. It is such a fun place, you'd be forgiven if you thought you where in Wonderland. It has a museum full of toys that it invented but failed to manufacture, mostly due to safety concerns. I can understand why some of them might have been thought of as dangerous, but boy are they cool!
Of course, with all the above, with the cost of employing and manufacturing in Europe, it can't compete with the cheapest-of-the-cheap Chinese factory which just mass produces plastic blocks. I understand that in this case, IP laws do not really cover its business, and anyone is legally able to copy them, but IMO it's rather sad to see that such companies can't really exist in this world, that consumers don't value the history and the culture of a company. They just look at a price tag and make their decision solely based on that.
Everyone I met at Lego is aware of these issues. They have carried massive restructuring plans since 2005, but they know they can't compete against most rivals whose costs are simply lower; yet they really want to preserve the unique culture that has made Lego, Lego for the past generations. Short of outsourcing manufacturing to some place in China, closing its museum and laboratory and airport and with it the town and becoming just another plastic manufacturer, I can't think of a way for them to survive. As I said, it's rather sad.
Re:Lego didn't invent them in the first place (Score:3, Informative)
Functional elements cannot be trademarked: true
Non-functional elements cannot be patented: false.
There are design patents that cover non-trademarked, non-functional parts of devices. I think that's what razor companies use to lock me into their replacement blades.
Google Translation (Score:5, Informative)
Here's the translated page [google.com]. And no, BabelFish did not produce a translation of the same quality.
Google frightens me sometimes. Almost every day now.
lego vs cheap knock-offs (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Let me attempt to translate... (Score:5, Informative)
Lego was naar het Europese Hof van justitie gestapt in de strijd tegen de Canadese concurrent Mega Brands, die een blokje op de markt heeft gebracht dat past op die van Lego. Het Hof oordeelde vandaag dat het ontwerp van Lego niet is beschermd door het Europees merkenrecht en dat er dus geen sprake mag zijn van alleenrecht.
Perhaps less fun..
But here is the more correct ( though quick and quite literal ) translation:
Lego went to the "Europese Hof" (a very high justice department in europe) in a battle against the Canadian competitor Mega Brands, who created a brick that fits on the lego brick. The "Hof" decided today that the design of Lego is not protected by the European Market rights, and that there thus cannot be any case for exclusive ownership.
Re:Let me attempt to translate... (Score:5, Informative)
Babel Fish to the rescue:
"Lego had stepped to the European Court of Justice in the fight against the Canadian competitor Mega fire, which a cube on the market has brought that watches out which of Lego. The court judged today that the design of Lego has not been protected by the European merkenrecht and that there can no talk be therefore of exclusive right."
Hmmm. Well my fish is almost 40 years old.
"Lego was, according to the European Court of Justice objected in the fight against the Canadian competitor mega brands, which is a cube on the market that has brought shall apply to those of Lego. The Court ruled today that the design of Lego not protected by the European trademark law and that there is no question of exclusive rights."
Nope. Still sounds like nonsense.
Here's what Deutsche Welle says: "The European Union's Court of First Instance turned down Lego's appeal to force the EU's trademarks and designs office to reissue its trademark for the shape of its standard red Lego brick with eight cylindrical knobs.
"The EU court, however, sided with a 2004 decision made by the EU agency, which had canceled Lego's trademark after rival toy maker Canada's Mega Brands Inc. filed an appeal to Lego's application. Mega Brands produces similar plastic building blocks that compete with Lego."
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah... I look at this as a mixed blessing.
I have a substantial collection of Lego, and I have a single MegaBlocks model... as much as I hate to say it, there's really a difference in quality. The Lego plastic is actually superior, and the quality of the molds must be better, too.
So while I'd like to be able to buy bulk packs of pieces (which I've done via bricklink for some years now) at cheap prices (at an average approaching $0.10 piece for a little piece of molded plastic?), I certainly wouldn't accept lower quality just to get cheaper pieces.
I'm all for competition, though. If Lego reduces prices (I know they whine they are barely making it... which is just baffling to me), then I'll be all over it. I mean, go ahead and charge $50 for a 400 piece Star Wars set... but let me buy bulk bricks to build my mega (no pun intended) structures, and I'll be a happy guy.
Sometimes on bricklink you can find pieces you like for less than a penny a piece... unfortunately, while I admit I don't look very often, I haven't seen that kind of deal in some time.
Lego moved ops to czech republic and mexico (Score:4, Informative)
Although Lego is still a danish company, I believe they moved all their production operations from Billund, Denmark and the US into the Czech Republic and Mexico back in 2006... So for what it's worth, maybe not China, but Czech republic and Mexico aren't known as hot-spots of eco-consciousness either...
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:5, Informative)
Lego are utterly fantastic at making their bricks. They're mind-bogglingly good, in fact. To work properly, Lego bricks must be made to a tolerance of one micron, otherwise models would fall apart or the bricks be too hard to separate. Those little plastic bricks are as precisely engineered as the most precisely engineered components in the most expensive Swiss watch. They've been making them exactly the right size since the 1960s - the bricks you or you parents had in the 60s will still work perfectly with the bricks they make today.
Re:I thought (Score:3, Informative)
Better prices and selection through bricklink [bricklink.com]. It's not just used parts, there are tons of brand new pieces there too (I presume bought in bulk from Lego stores).
Already there. (Score:3, Informative)
They're already in one. Lego has been able to keep Mega Blocks from selling in Europe until now via this bogus trademark law, but that was the last holdout. Most countries have already ruled against Lego [wikipedia.org] on this issue.
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:3, Informative)
The Lego plastic is actually superior, and the quality of the molds must be better, too.
They were pretty famous for being obsessive about mold quality and tolerances
slashdot article about manufacture:
http://entertainment.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/07/21/1716239 [slashdot.org]
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:5, Informative)
They've only been making them excatly right since 1980.
Re:Let me attempt to translate... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:4, Informative)
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:4, Informative)
I have one of those stores here (in GA), and it's actually very conveniently located for me...
I go there all the time, but there's only a few dozen types of pieces at a time, and those ROUND cups they have make it difficult to effectively use the space in them.
But I have bought pieces there plenty of times... but it surely doesn't beat bricklink when I want black or white or even gray 2x4 bricks and all they have is pink or purple 2x2 and 2x3, some fence pieces I don't want... the small car plates (but no wheels)...
But they rotate inventory in and so I do go there occasionally.
Re:Cheap = Good for parents (Score:3, Informative)
Primarily because the shape of the Lego brick is functional, while the shape of the Coca Cola bottle is not. You cannot trademark functional elements. Thus, while the cosmetic curves and ribbing of the bottle may be trademarked, the fact that it is a hollow, more-or-less cylindrical shape, narrowing at the top, cannot.
This also means that many specialized Lego bricks could probably be trademarked, but the generic ones cannot. Of course, with the specialized ones, they might have to show that they actually are associated with their brand, and not just random shapes that happen to carry the brand.
Re:Lego didn't invent them in the first place (Score:3, Informative)
This page supports this story:
http://www.hilarypagetoys.com/ [hilarypagetoys.com]
But this is just the internet so...
Re:Lego tried an end-run around the law (Score:3, Informative)
Couldn't competitors make equally functional, if incompatible, building blocks with square or hexagonal studs?
Studs that aren't round would pose a problem when you tried to build a hinged assembly, where one block pivots on the stud of another.
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:4, Informative)
they make good quality legos too. I was waxing nostalgic last year and bought a generic bin of legos at kmart or something, it wasn't lego brand but looked identical, and they held together like crap.
I remember taking my 2x8 blocks and seeing how far I could get them to extend horizontally while stacked, and could get over 50 sometimes. The crappy new ones were lucky to see 10.
I also made things that required proper tolerance. I made a working lego lock. Tried to make one with the new blocks but they kept catching on each other. crap I say. Pay the money and get the real Lego.
Re:Cheap = Good for parents (Score:0, Informative)
*YOU* are not Smidge.
=Smidge=
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:3, Informative)
For your modern weapon LEGO needs, I would check out this site: http://www.brickarms.com/Toys/Weapons.aspx [brickarms.com]
They claim it's made from the same plastic as real LEGOs, but I haven't used them. Anyways they seem pretty cool.
They also happen to make Nazi figurines for your enjoyment: http://www.brickarms.com/Toys/Minifigs.aspx [brickarms.com]
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:3, Informative)
According to one interview I read somewhere, the most expensive Lego parts to manufacture are the mini-figs. I believe they cost something like a little over $1 US to manufacture.
I seriously doubt that. They'd be selling them at a loss otherwise.
http://shop.lego.com/ [lego.com]
No blulk purchases there (Score:3, Informative)
True, they have quite a few elements there and in quite a few colors. However, they nowhere near all the common elements listed, and there are no bulk purchases. Sure, you can by a 1x1 yellow plate for about 10 cents. That is a pretty good deal if you need a single plate. But if you need 500 or 1000 such plates it is still about 10 cents a plates. That is not such a good deal. Sadly, they used to have some bulk packs with reasonable per-element prices. Those have all gone away.
LEGO does not understand how to market to Americans.
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:3, Informative)
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:4, Informative)
Probably too late for a proper reply. An old roommate of mine used to occasionally make dies. Like anything in manufacturing, pick two of three: accurate, hard-wearing, cheap. For high-speed production you need to make especially costly dies; even a cheap die for something the size of one Lego brick would set you back several hundred dollars, and you couldn't expect to use a very dense/high-quality plastic with it (due to injection pressures), nor expect it to last much beyond a few dozen or scores of casts for any sort of reasonable accuracy. I suppose for very high tolerances, sharp narrow edges (which Lego have), high speed, and hard plastics you would be paying many thousands (or more?) for the die; the costs grow enormously if you want a die for large pieces, i.e., more than a few square cm. And you would have to replace the die fairly often. The cost of the plastic is trivial compared to the capital cost of the die.
As for technological advances... well, there's only so much you can do to make tooling steel better; basically, it is a materials-science question, and the advances there are not quick. For instance, except for CAD/CAM there have not been significant advances in tooling that would help in the manufacture of the die, that I know of, for probably the last 50 years.
Re:makes sense, meh (Score:3, Informative)
The problem is also that, since Lego has been the only game in town for many years, the average Joe will think that everything that fits Lego blocks *is* made by Lego even if it really is a cheap knockoff. That will dilute the Lego brand itself, which is probably one of the things Lego wanted to avoid by taking these guys to court.
Too bad, so sad. I don't know European trademark law, but in the US, the Lego trademark is not the actual bits of the brick that make it compatible with the other bricks. That's functional anyway, so trademarks would never protect it. You'd want patents instead, and they are no longer available in this case. Using the functional parts of the brick in a dilutive way is perfectly okay. Now, when they use the word LEGO in some fashion, since that's actually a trademark, then we can begin to discuss dilution. Although saying "LEGO-compatible" is a nominative use, so that's also okay, if it's true.
Incidentally, what you were describing is actually customer confusion, which goes to trademark infringement; dilution is when there is no confusion, which is why it's kind of bullshit.