I own a few websites for children and I wanted to add some finger puppets for the book "Charlotte's Web." The would be simple drawings/jpegs of the characters. I wanted to have a girl (Fern), farmer (Mr. Zuccherman), a pig (Wilbur), and a spider (Charlotte). I was wondering if you think this would be copyright issue. I see many other web sites have Charlotte's web resources (worksheets and tests and whatnot). Can I have finger puppets with the names of these characters? If not, can I have generic finger puppets of these characters if I don't mention their names? I would not be using any artwork from the book. Thoughts? Thank you.
No of course you can't. The characters from the book are protected. You can use any original drawings and characters that you own, have permission, or have rights to, but NO.... You cannot use the characters from Charlotte's Web.
The characters in Charlotte's Web are almost certainly trademarked - and the original illustrations would be independently covered by copyright. A quick search of the USPTO turns up the following live registered trademark: IANAL, but you could be OK with a generic pig puppet, generic farmer puppet, etc, and didn't call them "Wilbur" or "Zuckerman". You'd be on shaky ground, though, if you had a spider puppet with words written in her web.
Realize that when the company that owns those copyrights gains the knowledge that you are improperly using them, they are FORCED to take legal action against you to uphold their ability to enforce their copyright in the future. A great case is when a small daycare painted disney characters on the side of their building and Disney was forced to take legal action against them. Disney suffered from a backlash of publicity, but the law clearly forced them to continue action. They even went as far as to send Disney Charachters created by the studio for free so that they could settle the matter without looking like an evil corporation in the media while maintaining their ability to sue for infringement in the future. I worked in a movie theatre in high school and I actually contacted studios to get permission to use copyrighted stuff on a regular basis. I know most theaters didn't but our manager required it. I was never told no in a written request and even got a few signed photos, givaways etc. back with my request. In other words - it doesnt hurt to ask, but dont use them without asking.
Thanks for the responses. In my gut, I knew I couldn't... I just see so many other web sites with Charlotte's Web resources for kids and teachers (and resources for other books) that I thought I'd ask.
They could be some kind of affiliate or have a relationship with the owners. You can't assume just because you see other people doing things on the web, that they haven't done their legal due diligence and are within the law.