MightyMagnus78 wrote:I'm not totally against third party creations, in fact some pieces are really, really nice. However I have often wondered how they are able to get away with it, without making trademark/copyright infringements.
Yep, I've often wondered the same.
MightyMagnus78 wrote:However what puzzles me most is why Has/Tak up until very recently seemed to just tolerate those 'high quality' HK KO's? Dinobots, combiners, G1's they're blood everywhere lately, they even come in 'authentic' G1 packaging FFS.
My only guess would be that since Has/Tak either can't (due to not having the molds intact/in their possession) or won't (due to insufficient demand for it to be worth it), they just disregard it. The only difference to Has/Tak's bottom line when it comes to KO's is if it's a product being KO'd that they actually still produce. If it's something from 10-20 years ago that they no longer have the mold for or don't see profit in producing and the only ones selling them (and thus the only ones making any profit) are the KO retailers and ebay sellers, then it has no effect on Has/Tak's bottom line period. There is no money taken out of their pockets by KO companies making a reproduction Shockwave for example, since, as I recall, they aren't even allowed to remake that toy themselves, but there is profit to be made by the KO manufacturers/sellers as well as the scammers on ebay trying to pass them off as the real thing.
Legally though, IP is IP, and whether it's a total KO or just slightly different enough (looking at you FP etc.) to get around a lawsuit, then it's still immoral IMO. It's making money off of another company's property without paying any royalties or getting any permission, but the law does allow it if it's just different enough (though the law itself is not about morality most of the time, it's about legality, which are two very different things).
Still, I say to each his own. If you don't like KO's, don't buy them. For me, if I can buy a legit figure from an actual retailer (where Has/Tak actually sees some money out of the deal), then that's what I'll get. But if the only sellers of a figure are the individuals (read, NOT retailers) on ebay and the prices are absurd, then KO is where I go. Of course, I only did that twice, though even once is enough to make me a complete hypocrite if I try to say that no one should buy KO's.
Hercules sits with all my Classics figures as does my KO Henkei Wild Rider. I won't be selling them, and if Has/Tak ever do decide to make something comparable (including a second run on Wild Rider like they did with Henkei Rodimus), then I'm all over it. There is still something to be said for the quality (for the most part) of what Has/Tak make when compared to most KO's and third party toys.
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A kind of fine line though they aren't exactly using the copyrighted names, only the slightly fan familiar likenesses 
