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Legal Issues

by Mike Masnick

Wed, Feb 2nd 2005 7:47pm





Is The Eiffel Tower Copyrighted?

from the wait-a-minute... dept

Well, here's the latest in a series of bizarre stories about intellectual property concepts gone ridiculous. Apparently, the city of Paris retook possession of the Eiffel Tower in 2003 and decided that they'd had enough of its likeness being in the public domain. So, what do you do? You change the lighting on it, copyright the new light display and voila, all nighttime photos of the Eiffel Tower are now illegal without a license. This serves what beneficial purpose exactly? It's hard to see how a photograph of a building that can be seen for miles around could be copyrighted in any way or what that could possibly serve any legitimate intellectual property purpose. It certainly sounds too bizarre to be true.

7 Comments | Leave a Comment

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    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, Feb 2nd, 2005 @ 8:06pm

    Reality...

    ...The French are pissed that Americans can go to Vegas and see a good knock-off of the Eiffel tower.
    They'd rather Americans go to their city to be insulted by wanna-be elitists to see the new way they arranged their lights. Who cares? Paris is a little bit more interesting than St. Louis. (I'm not knocking St. Louis) At least the people in Missouri are friendly and decent folks. I don't see the arch being claimed as intellectual property.

     

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      Stephen Paulger, Feb 3rd, 2005 @ 6:51pm

      Re: Reality...

      Having been to paris and having made photos and videos of the tower. I can assure you of two things. Firstly no one stops you from taking photos while you're there, I took a whole load while up the tower even. Secondly all the french people I met were really nice, even though I barely managed to make a mockery of their language. As a side-note the new lights are very pretty.

       

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      Andrew, Feb 28th, 2005 @ 5:55pm

      Re: Reality...

      Yeah, that's probably it.
      good one.

       

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  •  
    identicon
    Anonymous Hero, Feb 2nd, 2005 @ 9:25pm

    No Subject Given

    Just another example of where intellectual property laws are headed.

     

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    VonSkippy, Feb 2nd, 2005 @ 11:53pm

    blah

    How long until the French surrender the copyright to the Germans? Then whine to the US to help save it.
    Ooooh, the scary might of the French copyright office.
    Just kidding (or am I...)

     

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  •  
    identicon
    Chomper, Feb 3rd, 2005 @ 8:09am

    No Subject Given

    oui are idiots.

    -The French

     

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  •  
    identicon
    lisa, Feb 12th, 2013 @ 2:59am

    Eiffel tower facts

    This is definitely one of the best articles I have read in this website! Thanks Mate.

     

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