Olympic-Level Free-Speech Bullying
Via Feebs, Kyle Smith writes at NRO:
When a writer for the London Spectator dubbed this summer's activities "the censorship Olympics," he took note of an alarming new British law that, in affording special trademark protection to Olympics sponsors only, ordered the courts to look warily on any usage by a business (or charity!) of a word or phrase from column A (such as "games" or "two thousand twelve") with one from column B (such as "London"). Police were empowered to "enter land or premises" and "remove, destroy, conceal or erase any infringing article." All previous speech-protection laws and policies were superseded for the temporary emergency.So: A butcher in Weymouth, England, was forced to take down sausages arranged in rings. A village in Surrey was forbidden to hold an "Olympicnic" on its village green. Police ordered a newsdealer in East London to remove Union Jack bunting featuring the words "London 2012."
A pity this wasn't more widely known. We should have encouraged people to infringe. I'm for trademark protection, but this goes way beyond the pale. Free speech shouldn't be limited to those who buy it.
We get that in this country a little bit too. Pay attention to the radio ads in December and January as the NFL season winds up. They can't say the Holy Name directly, and have to talk around it, but you might hear a sports bar advertising how you can get a SUPER-delicious BOWL of chili at their place and watch the BIG GAME on their giant plasma televisions.
Old RPM Daddy at August 12, 2012 6:30 AM
It also sort of happens with March Madness. But they can only do so much because you can't really copyright March.
Jim P. at August 12, 2012 4:27 PM
By the way, I just noticed that the words "radio ads" in my comment got hyperlinked somehow to a Tumbleinto dot com site for selling radio ads. Just wanted to say I didn't do that!
Old RPM Daddy at August 12, 2012 5:07 PM
I'm not seeing the link in mine.
Use Firefox and get AD-Block Plus and Ghostery. I miss 98% of the strange links and ads.
Jim P. at August 12, 2012 10:12 PM
Not only is free speech affected, but commerce is too. My buddy is a big Great Britain fan, has a mini, etc., and was really excited to buy the Team GB shirt at the Team London website. However, whenever he goes there (http://shop.london2012.com/), it redirects him to the Team USA shop (http://www.teamusashop.com/).
Using a UK proxy resolved this, but he still couldn't buy the shirt, as he had a US credit card and US shipping address. Only way around it is to hit someone up on Craigslist, pay them to have them buy & ship to him. All for a $12 shirt...
The London Organizing Committee's response:
I apologise for your troubles in accessing the Team GB store in the USA. After speaking to LOCOG regarding your troubles, I yesterday received the following response:
Unfortunately people residing within the USA are not able to access the London 2012 Shop website and will always be redirected to the Team USA website. As the Team USA have their own website, they have the agreement to sell the Olympic Merchandise exclusively and therefore the London Organising Committee of the Games (LOCOG) are not licensed to sell merchandise in the USA.
If you reside in the USA we are unable to accept your order. The online retail rights granted to LOCOG by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) do not extend to the USA. We can however ship orders to the USA if the billing address provided is within another country outside the USA.
Therefore the only way for someone residing in the USA to receive items from the London 2012 Shop is to have someone outside the USA place the order for them.
Kind Regards,
The London 2012 Shop Customer Service Team
Unfortunately we do not sell merchandise directly and the online London 2012 shop is run separately from us, however the LOCOG contact email address is london2012service@shop.london2012.com if you have further enquiries regarding this. I hope this helps you to get your hands on some Team GB kit.
Kind Regards,
Agnes
Patrick W at August 13, 2012 8:15 AM
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