(Podcast) The Briefing: Protecting Fictional Characters – Copyright and Trademark Strategies
Mickey Mouse: un ratón con abogado
(Podcast) The Briefing: The Ninth Circuit Puts the Brakes on Eleanor’s Copyright Claim
The Briefing: The Ninth Circuit Puts the Brakes on Eleanor’s Copyright Claim
Key Takeaways - Public Domain Day 2026 releases thousands of creative works for free use. As of January 1, literary works from 1930 and sound recordings from 1925 are now available without copyright restrictions....more
Can a car, a superhero, or even a cartoon sidekick be protected by copyright? In this episode of The Briefing, Scott Hervey and Matt Sugarman break down how fictional characters earn legal protection — and when they don’t. ...more
Steamboat Willie, the cartoon best known as the debut of Mickey and Minnie Mouse, is the subject of a new legal controversy. The law firm Morgan & Morgan created a commercial based on the iconic cartoon and is seeking a legal...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed a district court’s dismissal of a copyright infringement claim finding that the plaintiff had not plausibly alleged copying of protected characters. Anna Biani v....more
En este episodio de "A Lo Legal En Par Minutos", Edwin Cortés, socio, conversa con Juana Cajiao Reina, abogada del área de propiedad intelectual, sobre la importancia del derecho marcario y el derecho de autor para proteger a...more
In a new precedential decision, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held in Carroll Shelby Licensing, Inc. v. Halicki that “Eleanor,” a stable of Ford Mustangs that appears across four action films, is not a copyrightable...more
Can a car be a copyrightable character? In Carroll Shelby Licensing v. Halicki, the Ninth Circuit said no — ruling that “Eleanor,” the iconic Mustang from ‘Gone in 60 Seconds,’ lacks the distinctiveness and consistency...more
The Copyright Act does not expressly address the protection of individual characters in expressive works, but courts have long recognized that certain characters, particularly those with strong visual or narrative identities,...more
District court grants Disney’s motion for summary judgment, holding it did not infringe plaintiffs’ copyright in blue-eyed ukulele-playing turtle character, but rather independently created its own musical turtle character,...more
Ninth Circuit holds that custom Ford Mustang called “Eleanor,” which appeared in four films from 1974 to 2000, is not entitled to character copyright protection under Towle test and that licensor of custom car design did not...more
Court Narrows Scope of Character Copyright, Drawing Sharp Line Between Props and Protectable Expression - Not every film icon gets legal protection. On May 27, 2025, the Ninth Circuit ruled that Eleanor—the legendary Mustang...more
Celebrated on the first day of every year, Public Domain Day marks the day works with copyrights that expired the year prior enter the public domain. While the calculations to determine copyright expiration can be complicated...more
Defamation cases are hard ones in the real world. Recent US matters involving Dominion Voting, Sara Palin, and even Cheetos show that these cases continue to interest the general public as well as legal cognoscenti....more
At heart, and still, I am a non-singing Jersey Boy, and one who grew up reading Sherlock Holmes stories and watching Star Trek, the Original Series (before it even needed that modifier), in reruns in the 1970s while also...more