HS agents bust toy store
p2pnet.net News:- The use of US law enforcement agencies for commercial copyright enforcement has reached a shocking level in America.
“Aren’t there any terrorists out there?” – Pufferbelly Toys owner Stephanie Cox asked two US Department of Homeland Security agents when they arrived at her in St Helens store, just north of Portland, Oregon.
The federal agents were looking for a $6.99 toy described on the Pufferbelly Toys web site as a “Classic Cubic Puzzler with a new twist. Item# 2618 (Ages from 8 to 99)”
When they arrived at the store, “the lead agent asked Cox whether she carried a toy called the Magic Cube, which he said was an illegal copy of the Rubik’s Cube, one of the most popular toys of all time,” says an Associated Press story, going on:
“He told her to remove the Magic Cube from her shelves, and he watched to make sure she complied.”
AP quotes Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, as saying agents went to Pufferbelly based on a trademark infringement complaint filed in the agency’s intellectual property rights center in Washington, DC.
Kice goes on: “One of the things that our agency’s responsible for doing is protecting the integrity of the economy and our nation’s financial systems and obviously trademark infringement does have significant economic implications.”
But as a Fouquet points out in a /. post, “The patent for Rubik’s cube was issued in 1980, and so it is expired.”
Expired or not, this is another example of a national US law enforcement agency being used for a purely commercial purpose.
It now routine for the entertainment industry to use the FBI, Department of Justice and other police agencies to act on its behalf.
===================
See:-
Pufferbelly Toys – Federal Homeland Security Agents Visit Toy Store, Associated Press, October 28, 2004
Rubik’s cube - Dept. of Homeland Security Enforces Expired Trademark, slashdot, October 19, 2004
expired – Spatial logical toy, US Patent Office
routine – DoJ backs PDEA and PIRATE bills, p2pnet, October 13, 2004
October 29th, 2004 at 7:23 pm
I took a few minutes and emailed the owner a few questions, heres what she had to say:
From: Chris [mailto:xxxxxx_xxxxxxxx@yahoo.com]
Sent: Friday, October 29, 2004 6:22 AM
To: Owner_NOSPAM@pufferbellytoys.com
Subject:
Hello,
I was wondering if i could get a minute and ask you a
few questions in regards to your “Magic Cube” scandal
that was just reviewed by me.
1. What do you think is the Department of Homeland
Security’s real objectives and agendas?
2. You’ve experianced first hand the reality of this
paid-for-by-tax-dollars pseudo-government association
that seeks to take away the rights of innocent shop
owners and other citizens, how do you think this
situation should have been handled instead?
3. Are you planning to file a lawsuit against the DOHS
for harrassment? It would be in your best interest and
I think that you could establish more credibility
towards why the DOHS is in fact, untrained,
unprofessional and needs to be reorganized by someone
other then George Bush.
4. (Unrelated) Are you still selling this toy? If not,
can you refer me to where I might be able to get one?
Honestly, you have every right to sell this toy
legally.
5. What do you think got the DOHS’s interest in this
case to begin with?
Copyright and patent enforcement obviously has nothing
to do with DOHS’s priorities and their main objective
is, as you quoted, to stop criminals, keep the country
safe from mass-terrorism and everything that falls in
between. This was just an example of them coming in
and doing as they please, and this is what happens
when people like them get a liiiitle bit of power. I’m
sure they knew that the rubiks’ cube patent expired
years ago, heck even I knew that, but i would strongly
suggest a lawsuit against the DOHS.
Your situation was referred to me by http://www.p2pnet.net, a
news site primarily in the interest of the
peer-to-peer scene, the file-sharing community, and
government associations doing exactly what happened to
you.
Just say No to media exploitation
-Chris
(And the response:)
————————-
Hi there,
In answer to your questions….
1) I do not know their motives. The agents were following orders, so
motive for them would be to not get fired. However, this is indicative
of how one complaint filed by a big business (i.e. my assumption that
Rubiks were the ones to place the complaint) gets more respect and
response than an individual citizen or small business.
2) A phone call to resolve it. Maybe not even wasting the time to begin
with?
3) I have no plans to file a lawsuit at this time.
4) I am selling the toy at http://www.pufferbellytoys.com
5) Big Business (Rubiks) filed the complaint with Washington DC and as
we know, our current administration is all about making big business
happy and wealthy.
Thanks for your interest. Keep in touch. I will tell more as I find out
more.
Sincerely
Stephanie Cox
Owner
(Let’s all give the owner a big warm praise of sympathy for her maturity and being reasonable during her unfortunate run-in with these assholes..And buy the toy from her, damnit!! This controversy and their ignorance can only hurt THEM if we all purchase a toy and never buy anything from the makers of Rubiks’ Cube. Down with big companies trying to call all the shots! I personally am going to go to wal-mart and steal as many of those damn cubes as possible, and then mail them to the DOHS so they can learn how to move the world, one cube at a time; which seems to be their objective. Heck, those cubes will teach them more then their training ever did. Just imagining 300 DOHS agents trying to match the colors up makes me laugh
I personally that their motive was, as you said, purely by financial gain. Pretty sad the way some companies run things, i guess someone rewrote the book on “How to run a business” and these government lackeys actually picked it up and didnt use it for a coffee coaster.. You would think that even Rubiks’ knew about their patent being null and void. Talk about beating a dead horse though..This is even worse then Microsoft selling the first Halo for 60 bucks 4 years later after its release)
October 29th, 2004 at 7:27 pm
http://www.pufferbellytoys.com/pbt/Home/Page/Product_Detail/Item/2618
Purchase one, or two, or 10!
October 29th, 2004 at 9:51 pm
Hi Chris: Thanks – nice one ; p
http://p2pnet.net/story/2862
Cheers!