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Reality Check: Market reality - MARQUES conference Part 8
For those who managed to resist the seductive lake view and warm sun outside the conference center, the after-coffee session on market reality ambitiously covering charity branding/ green branding/ celebrity branding/guerilla marketing/ pop-up shops as well as ambush marketing was indeed quite interesting. Dan Teeuwissen of Knijff Trademark Attorneys, Chair of the MARQUES Education Team and Session Chair introduced the wide topic and gave the floor to Daretia Austin of Time Warner Inc.and also member of the MARQUES Education Team and Milan Milojevic of Zivko Mijatovic & Partners (Serbia).
Daretia presented the 'TV everywhere' and 'Content everywhere' media industry initiatives to adress consumer requests for 'I want it now' access to media content ranging from tv shows to magazines. Ultraviolet where you buy movies on the cloud. Daretia spoke about how such initiatives could actually reduce piracy.
Milan then discussed how the evolvement of how TV content is distributed and the current technologies for TV content distribution via the net.
Unavoidably, such developments create new challenges, including the reality of simultaneous branding by content owners and service providers.
Daretia raised the question whether current brand filing strategies are actually sufficient in the face of new developments and gave practical examples about which international classes are relevant depending on the status of the program/film, i.e. greenlit, airing or 'big hit'.
Milan then discussed an interesting merchandinsing issue, the 'expansion of the brand', giving the example of Harry Potter, evolving from a book and series of movies to a merchandising mega hit. He also noted how brand owners may use actors from popular films - brands, creating an 'innocent' and permissible association with their own brand. Milan provided a very interesting example of the interplay between product-placement and brand expansion featuring omega watches and the 007 films with Daniel Craig. Both Milan and Daretia then presented colorful examples of negative product placement and made a smooth connection with celebrity marketing issues.
Milan then discussed the key differences between expanded brands and celebrity rights, in the field of legal protection, trademark filing strategies (including his advice to celebrity wannabes to promptly file for trademark protection) and social behavior / society protection.
Daretia then outlined the difficulties of online infringement and protection strategies, including takedown strategies and policies and the issues that may arise with ISPs.
Milan talked about counterfeiting in the media industry focusing on customs seizures and pointing out that it is merchandised goods that comprise the large number of customs seizure instances, (a brand expansion infringement). Milan further mentioned a particularity of media industry infringements, namely devices for on-line infringement, such as set-up boxes, media stations, receivers and modchips.
Daretia, closing the very interesting session, discussed fan sites and the extent of tolerance of brand owners and a presented an immensly fun fan clip on ebay.
Posted by: Nikos Prentoulis @ 10.53Tags: Baveno Conference 2011,
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