copyright/trademarks in webpages
 

I have very little knowledge of computers outside of the normal email-checking, web-browsing, etc. So I decided to take a class in webpage design.

We were having a discussion this morning about web ethics, and some questions I'd never considered came up. The prof was completely in the dark about how to answer the questions, and the students seemed to be running the conversation (gotta love summer school classes).

For instance, one of the topics was about copyright/trademark use on webpages. I guess most universities have their logos copyrighted or trademarked (as do most, if not all, GLOs). So, if someone has a webpage for, let's say, University of Tennessee football fans, they can't legally use a UT logo on their page, unless they get permission from UT itself. Right? I've never really thought about things like that. But who at each university has the time to approve/disapprove every proposed webpage?

Where am I going with this?

I guess I'm just surprised that using a school's logo or official mascot, or using a sorority's letters is copyright infringement or trademark "abuse" (I don't know the right word for that).

Have any of you ever started a web page and incorporated your GLOs letters or your school's mascot? Is it really a big deal? Do people actually get in legal trouble for creating webpages that have such items on it? (I'm talking about legit webpages, not pages bashing schools or GLOs.)

Like I said, I'm delving into new territory here, just trying to learn something new.

My school had an acceptable use policy for it's mascot and symbols. We could display it but not alter it in any way. Much as my sorority has an acceptable use policy for our official letterhead designs (same as on webpages) etc.

It was just one more thing to keep in mind when designing our webpage. Now if I wanted to start a random website and use the school's mascot, I'd either have to get permission (definately if I was selling something) or follow the policy.

Um basically, find the policy!

If your website is tasteful and not used for any sort of business/marketing purposes, then I doubt most GLOs or Universities would bother doing anything about it. Could you possibly get into trouble? Yes, if it's trademarked. But if the universities don't have time to approve/deny trademark usage, they have even less time to patrol the web looking at everyone's myspace and geocities pages.

Well I'm certainly NOT a lawyer, or anything like that, BUT I would think that if you are a member of the sorority and making a webpage for your specific chapter of that sorority, then as long as you put a disclaimer that this page doens't reflect the views of ABC international... and follow any rules that they may set foward for what information is on the page, it shouldn't be a big deal.