We did especially with a lot of products that we felt were in direct breach of several trademarks and our slowly developing links with Hasbro UK, but we have been looking over it for the last few months and revising it quite extensively.

As a result, we do have a new more fan and dealer-friendly policy in place that we are going to be releasing soon that will be a lot more flexible, while still working within the boundaries of what is and isn't a blatant copyright infringement. We've spent a lot of time working on this to get it right, working with our dealers to ensure that it's as fair as possible for everyone. There will still be some items that we won't be allowing at the convention, but we're using common sense and working with our dealers and their experience with their local trading standards officers to find common ground that works for everyone.

We should have this up on our website within the next week.  

 

It would be interesting to see the differences between English/UK IP law and the US. Have you read anything on this?

 

This is lame for dealers, because the money will not be made like they want to....I like how Hasbro waited until everybody paid for their booth, tickets...then drop the banned...Hasbro is full of shit, because none of the 3rd parties designs look like any of that bullshit they sell in retail or online.....you can call me whatever, but fuck hasbro...never going to botcon ever, Im gonna email Fun Pub and tell them to cancel my membership after I recieve Runabout...they can keep their weak ass magazine...as far as we know they're the thieves who sold our information...I'm learning towards getting out of this hobby...im gonna be 50 year old and finally complete my updated G1 cartoon cast...bullshit...

 

This is something that applies here in the UK as well. However, what we're doing with Auto Assembly is adopting age restrictions on certain toy sales which all dealers will have to comply with. All standard European and US released toys will be clearly marked and will have passed recognised toy safety checks so these will be fine to be sold to any attendee. However, as imported Japanese toys don't have these toy safety marks (nor will any third party toys), then we will be prohibiting the sale of these to any attendee under the age of 18. We do have a system in place for dealers to easily identify whether someone is eligible to purchase a toy or not, and if dealers are found knowingly selling toys to minors, they will be asked to leave the convention.

 

We've been doing a fair bit of research and we do have our own legal experts on the committee so that does help somewhat! We have been consulting with dealers to get this right as well who have discussed third party products with their local trading standards representatives so they know what they have been allowed to sell in the past in retail premises, so we've been doing a lot of preparation for this.

What we are making sure is that we have a clear list for all our dealers highlighting all of the "approved" products, our clear banned list, and then we will be working closely with everyone regarding anything that they are uncertain of so there will be no confusion over what is and isn't allowed. We have got dealers attending from all over the UK and overseas and we want to make the whole trading experience as easy and as transparent as possible for everyone.

 

oh boy ...this will not end well... but obviously shit just got real, like what was previously made a promise by Hasbro/Takaratomy

 

I feel the same way. I went back into collecting older Sentai and Megazords. Seems to be more fun than what Hasbro is doing.

 

  Im SICK & tired of ppl saying that Hasbro "can do it, they have a right" & "Their actions are justified"! You cant own/copyright a word, transform is a general idea, not something owned by 1 person. Even if it is, there are still going to be other companies that want to provide something similar! They are not trying to f*** up your company, just trying to provide a good product! Hasbro was the first & is still the biggest, but that shouldn't mean you have the right to limit or block other companies just because you feel a little threatened! (Thats a monopoly & monopolies are unconstitutional)If you cant provide a good enough product that the others can, then its your fault! And instead of attacking the other producer companies, play fairly & start making better products, u are the leading company after all it shouldn't be that hard to make something better than your lesser known counterpart(s)! Your a BIG business, a good ~90-95% of your consumer base cant access the others so you shouldn't even feel the LEAST bit threatened! You make WAY more money than any of the other companies so start using it & make better PRODUCTS!

God ppl, stop backing up Hasbro b/c we all know they can do better  

 

F-Hasblo, we should start another convention to spite them.

 

I think it's time for something new to come up that challenges Botcon, although time will only tell if the brave will answer the call. Bottom line is, currently Fun Publications isn't handling the ball well and people are getting more and more dissatisfied. Will anyone answer the call?

 

Just a quick observation, food for thought, so to speak. Hasbro bans third party toys, toy that have no name infringement, and the only thing they share in common, realistically, is the transformation gimmick, which, let us be honest, was around before Hasbro really sold them. Now, yes, Takara did have them for a very long time, but so did Bandai and many other manufacturers. Transforming robots is hardly a new idea, nor one that belongs to a single entity. With all that in mind, how is a third party company selling a transforming robot any different than say...Hasbro selling a LEGO like product and naming it the very similar sounding Kreo...Technically, Kreo's are third party Lego sets LOL...ok, thats my two cents.  

 

To many fanboys riding the hasbro/tak pipe....... mattel has them to..... in thier eyes "corporate can do no wrong!"

 

^^THIS

 

Yes you can trademark a word Transformers is a trademarked name. The concept of transforming robots is not copyrightable, and Hasbro isn't going after third party companies because they are making transforming robots, they're going after them because they are making transforming robots that look very similar to their characters.

Third Party companies make figures for characters that Hasbro hasn't made, if they didn't than we wouldn't have this conversation. That is where the IP infringement comes in. If it didn't infringe on Hasbro's property than people wouldn't say they're taking the place of X character on their shelves.

 

There are several smaller conventions that don't restrict what products can be sold you can always go to those. I highly recommend Cybcon in Washington State. If you're hoping there will be a convention Botcon size that focuses on third party or all Transforming toys, I think you'll be waiting quite a while. That and you won't have Hasbro's participation.

 

Yes but what if Lego has a convention (if they do I dont know) and dealers are only allowed to sell Legos products and nothing else. That would be the same thing and fully understandable.

Its not backing them up on the words you say, It is THEIR convention in a way. It is more then just selling toys, its also alot of advertisment of ppl running in and buying toys, seeing what is avaliable. Do you think a company want other products there that take away their advertisment from their products.

Man ppl in this forum are really out of the loop if they cant see that simple logic.

 

hell yeah brother but i do own an extensive amount of hasbro products about 90%is hasbro the rest are products made to enhance my current transformer collection and is not in any way affiliated with hasbro or any of its associates love my third party accessorize and i love my hasbro so cmon a total ban would b stupid like jackn off with icyhot just dont let blatant toys in sorry faithleader and traitor cant come to bot con but its ok i still got my computer so i can still get them else where i dont need botcon join my boycott

 

Care to tweet the deets?
Lol

 

Classics Springer: sold (however many) years ago. No longer on the market people bought it up.
Warbot Defender: came out a year or 2 ago? Still there, slowly being consumed again.

Universe Devastator: sold (however many) years ago. No longer on the market people bought it up.
Hercules & Giant: out recently, selling well.

Classics Megatron: sold (however many) years ago. No longer on the market people bought it up.
That 3rd party Hegetron(?): getting great preorders I'm sure.

Has/Tak upgrade set for Prime molds/Rodimus mold/Superion/Bruticus: will never be made
Fansproject/Maketoy/other upgrade sets for varios Has/Tak molds. On the market, enhancing Has/Tak product, encouraging Has/Tak purchases.

If anything 3rd party companies are a little late to the game, if you ask me. Seems like Hasbro took their shot, and at the time succeeded, but now (that the product is also no longer available) they're failures in comparison to the nicer stuff.

 

I'm certainly not going to condone the way this has been handled but there are two key factors to all of this. There are some products that are blatantly illegal and shouldn't be allowed and I would fully support Hasbro's decision on these. In fact, we're putting some on our own prohibited list but those are ones that are in clear breach of one of Hasbro's copyright/trademarks etc. or another.

Whether this applies to a direct knock-off, the renamed movie knock-offs that came out last year, the over-sized Armada minicons or anything similar, or 99% of the toys produced by iGear which are undeniably Hasbro characters, even to the casual observer.

However, the heavy-handed approach being taken of a blanket-ban is the wrong way to go as there are a lot of toys that are perfectly legal and with the right precautions in place to make sure they are only sold to adult collectors, there's no reason why they can't be sold at any event. At Auto Assembly, we tried a more widespread approach a few years ago and to be honest, it didn't work. While there were toys that we banned because they needed to be, we ended up applying the rules to toys that we shouldn't have banned so we've had to move with the times and acknowledge that these toys have a part to play as long as we are sensible about it.

Part of the appeal of a dealers room at any convention - not just Transformers - is the ability to see a wide range of items "in the flesh" before buying them that you wouldn't be able to otherwise and have access to almost anything you want. If it becomes limited to just what you'd find at retail, then the entire dealers room will lose its appeal for most people especially - as many have already said - prices will be higher than in-store because of dealer overheads to take booths in the first place.