Hey there all,

Well I stumbled across a letter on PCModeler, one of my daily stops on the internet, and I stumbled across this letter that you can read in the link below about Licensing in our world of Modeling.

Its a very interesting read, maybe slightly on the paranoid side...but the results of licensing could end our hobby as we know it, or at least severly hamper it.

Have a look.


Licensing Letter

Hey Scott:
There was a thread here a couple of months ago regarding this upcoming problem .I'm not sure if this is a paranoid reaction or not. Everyone wants a piece where ever they can get it. Do we buy up our model caches to avoid higher prices or do we make "fictional/whatifs" models? It really burns my ,the second you start having fun someones got to spoil it! . Hopefully these guys use there noddles and don't kill the industry all together. I suppose I can afford a small % increase on our prices, but if they get crazy I my have to pursue my other hobby, antique autos :-) .

Regards
Bruce

Bruce, it certainly ISN'T paranoia. Just ask the Model Railroaders out there what happened with the lawsuits against some of the manufacturers for 'Infringing Copyright' on the company liveries....

This is one hell of a serious issue -one that we will be hearing more about in the months and years to come. Ludicrous yes, sadly all too real...Jim

OK, I think maybe Paranoid was a poor choice of words.

The feeling I got from the author of the letter was that the whole licensing issue would put big model companies out of business, rather than just put the prices up. Which I though a little on the extreme side.

I think more of what will happen is that model companies will do alot more research as to what we modelers want, and only produce the upper few choices as new releases, but in return we would be paying a higher premium for them due to the extra cost of licensing.

However its nice to see that someone in Congress is willing to take up the cause, agreing that something that is used by the Armed Forces is actually Public Domain and should not be charged a licensing fee on. See what happens there.

I guess the best thing to do is like he said, write Congressman Robert Andrews, then write your own Congressman telling him the same, so you have more to help.

He was right the more letters they get the more they pay attention, but if nobody writes, then they think nobody cares, and they will just give it to them.
Kerry