Looking for Copyright vs Trademark vs Patent Discussion

General Introduce Yourself!
21

And there is the question. I was wondering when someone might ask that question. (My answer is not specifically directed at you as I’m sure others may wonder.)

So let me ask another question. Does asking too many question mean something ominous or nefarious?

Let’s assume we were in a class room and the teacher says “Gordon, you ask too many questions. Why are you asking so many questions in class?” Does that sound odd?

I could spread out my questions over time, delay my curiosity or just remain ignorant. These options do not help me learn and waste’s my time. Everyone else has the ability to answer or not answer.

Let me bring up another scenario. We all admire people that we will never meet either living or dead.

If we were given a chance to meet them for 10 minutes, would we just sit there and be afraid to ask questions fearing that he/she thinks we ask too many questions?

I am an expert in other fields. I’m not even a novice in this.

If there are kind people out there that are willing to share their knowledge so that I can elevate myself. Great. I do that in my own field. Does that create more competition for me? Nope. Some people don’t want to learn. No problem. Some people are afraid to ask questions. No problem. Some people are desperate to learn and I will share everything I know. Unfortunately, an even smaller portion will retain what I show them. What I see the real goal is…

Creativity. True creativity is rare. And you can’t get there without those skills. When was the last truly creative, ground breaking idea within the watch world? (BTW, don’t expect it from me and I don’t know it either.) But without sharing those skills to as many people as possible, the truly revolutionary idea will be slow to come.

One of the world’s greatest violinist was asked “Who he thought would be the greatest?” He said, someone who will never have a chance to play the violin.

So are my questions nefarious? Or should I be more concern of what others think (or fear) ahead of my curiosity?

BTW, I don’t hire people who don’t ask questions.

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Thank you Veertualia.team

23

Oh. You totally misunderstood me. I am a teacher, i love people who ask questions.

It wasn‘t my goal to tell: “You are asking too much questions“.

I only would like to know why do you ask those questions…

I just wanted to know your goals - for that maybe we could help you more specific in whatever decision you want to make.

My question wasn‘t meant offensive or agressive in any way…

Greetings, GAUSS.

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My bad. Not a problem. I suspect that my idea is way beyond my current skills and that it could likely go beyond the default tool set fairly quickly and may then involve programming.

But one step at a time. I haven’t even tried the software yet. I just don’t want to waste my time so I might as well see what people think of the sandbox.

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You’re very welcome.
Don’t give up. Samsung Gear Watch Designer, Watchmaker and Facer would be my choice to start playing. No inversion needed - except for your time - and a short learning curve. Applying for the Galaxy Store and start earning some money is the most straightforward process of all.

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@Gordon
If you are “playing” at Facer give Facer the courtesy of hosting your designs. Otherwise, it’s unprofessional to use Facer’s resources for designs that cannot be synched at Facer.

While we’re on the topic of copyrights, it is interesting how many phone desktop wallpaper images are being used for watch face designs. I don’t know if this is because people like to coordinate their phones and watches or because they do not understand the copyright rules. If you are looking for an easy image, it’s best not to fall into the habit of snagging copyrighted work.

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Agreed. I support designer’s rights to control their own creation and for those that make a living from their efforts, there needs to be rules and regulation and…enforcement. But enforcement is difficult and expensive. To the end of time, there will always be fake LV bags sold across the world.

I would like to see if I can make a few pennies with my design but I also wanted to understand whether there was a fair place to start. Not looking for the wild west.

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I’m not sure I understand exactly where unprofessionalism lies, this time. Care to explain?

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The way I see it, to use Facer’s resources with the requirement that customers must go elsewhere in order to obtain the design is spam.

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Hi, I’m not fully understanding.

Do people get designs from elsewhere (ie. copyright material) and use Facer resources at the same time is unprofessional?

Are you then saying that people should develop their own design in Facer versus using copying protected material in Facer?

Or are you saying that people are using the knowledge from the community and then go develop on another platform?

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Exactly.

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Exactly what?
You are confusing designing with distributing.

Facer is not a design tool. Unless you stick with the default components and play Lego.

Any original watch face is made of graphic elements created with specific tools like Photoshop and/or Cad software. These elements are then assembled (and interactivity may be added), either by creating a standalone app with a compiler software (like Android Studio) or by means of platforms like Samsung Gear Watch Designer, Watchmaker or Facer.

Once you’ve done assembling, you can distribute the watch face on the Play Store, Galaxy Store or Facer, depending on the tool you’ve used. With the further, not negligible difference that, while with Android Studio you create, distribute and own a .apk file, with Gear Watch Designer a .tpk file and with Watchmaker a .watch file, nothing of the sort happens with Facer (why am I not surprised?).

I sell many watch faces designs on the Play Store and on the Galaxy Store. Yet, curiously, neither Google nor Samsung asks for an exclusive distribution agreement.
They must have a very high unprofessionalism tolerance threshold.

Some of my watch faces, featuring the same design, have different characteristics depending on the specificity of the platform. Consequently, they have different prices. My Wear OS watch faces, for example, have more features, since I can truly access and program the watch hardware, hence they are a little more pricey.

More features imply higher prices.
Less features, lower prices. And if you force me to put a zero price tag on my watch face on your distribution platform, than you get zero features. In other words, a demo version.

It’s plain simple. It’s my design. I decide what I give away for free.

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To be clear and concise:

  1. If you are going to design use your own work.
  2. If you are going to distribute a paid product, don’t do it with strings attached as a vehicle to elsewhere for purchase.
  3. It is my understanding that Facer is a business, not a school. The fact that they offer resources to help their members is a courtesy. Respect that.
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34

WatchMaker also has IAP and the designers selling in app are by invitation only. No exclusivity for us there either so we can sell the same faces on there as on other platforms. I just tend to change them a little if going multi platform. I was selling in app, on the play store and galaxy store for a few years now, but dropped play store since it got confusing selling the same faces on there as in app and dealing with updates etc.

Also to add a little to the sandbox… WatchMaker doesn’t charge a monthly subscription fee to use the full set of tools. So everyone can create designs with full scale custom scripts, at layer custom scripting, multiple colors, multiple functions on tap, themes, etc. without needing to cough up a monthly fee to do so.

GWD is decent for Tizen faces since at least free and creators can use actions for creating multiple colors etc. on a single face design. I actually have always liked the desktop program compared to any other app’s I have tried, but it still is a bit quirky and limited as you mentioned above. As for the free Facer creator… It’s actually limited the most of the 3, but has custom scripting for layers at least. The inability to add multiple colors via action if not a seller has always been a turn off to me but it’s still very easy to use to assemble a nice design with. I have tried others as well but stick to these 3 as primary and for any free faces I may create try to publish to all 3.

35

It is very much a business, all right.
Now, since we agree, enlighten me: How would they, legitimately, make money out of it without offering resources to the designers? Could they feature a collection of over 70.000 - mostly free - watch faces?
It’s not an offer. It’s an exchange.

Respect has nothing to do with it. Besides it doesn’t pay the bills.

36

I moved a while ago to designs for Tizen only, great standalone tool all you can do with a Samsung watch is available and they don’t make you pay if you wanne make something good…

If you are an beginner and just ad some hands to a picture Facer is great and free… If you want to make something good you can do a few thing with Facer but you have to pay… and the stupid things is if you pay you can make better faces and more traffic so Facer makes more money… a designer pay’s and get nothing out of it on Facer…

Last year one of us got the change to “make partner” and after reading the conditions and “rules” went off running to Samsung store :slight_smile:

But to be honest… publishing at Play or Samsung store is a lot more work… you have to make the right artwork and you have to fill in a lot of forms… but your in control and get the best tools for free… (Samsung designer is great but still in Beta) One other big pro is that on Facer your design get lost in the huge amount of crap that is made and published… it seems you are aloud to download all pictures from the internet and add a few hands and publish them as watch-face… Some people did publish over 500 faces… (I will not point out names this time)

I did registered my brand(name) so I can claim my designs as my own in a few countries (working on more) .

Facer is nice if you have limited skills or just want to break the record of most uploaded faces, if you have a little bit more ambition and skills the other platforms offer you a lot more and don’t even make you pay to use your talent…

And beside all of that, Facer don’t even care to fix problems before making people pay… how many times do they answer withe the line “we are aware of the problem and working hard to fix things”

It’s like selling you a car with broken breaks, and letting you know that they working hard to fix them (maybe,someday if the winds is from the right direction) but they still make you pay the full price… And the excuse "were a small team " it’s not smart to give the answer of the problem yourself…

Please Facer stop selling a product that is not finished… there is a huge list of broken things that are know by staff (just read the support section).

And for Pete sake use decent software to prevent copyright violations…

37

To send watch faces to your watch with WatchMaker you need a one time purchase of the Pro version either by IAP from the standard version or by installing the Pro version directly. Further IAP is required only for watch face packages sold inside the app. This is from a user perspective.

By a designer perspective, however, while it’s true that there is also a partner program, at the same time you are not bound to it. When you purchase the Pro version, as any regular user, you get access to all the design features of the platform, and you can package your watch face and sell it by yourself on the Play Store by using Android Studio.

Of course. I would do the same, with a free design.

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The greatest mystery of all times. Care to share that information? Even privately.

39

I thank you all for the great thoughts on where to go and what to do.

I personally have something I want to make for myself but also hope that others may find useful and pluck down a dollar or two at some future point in time.

I am concerned that my concept may require some programming and cannot entirely rely just on the default pieces from the platform. It sounds like Facer has some easier pieces that can be used to put something together but if i want something more sophisticated, then other platforms are better? But there is difficulty with earning on Facer compared ot others?

I do have a high hurdle on the design side as well. I need to learn about photoshop or any other design tools as well.

I could assume that it is simple and all the pieces of my concept can be handled by Facer or others with their default elements and without programming. But I could then run into a dead end if it is more sophisticated than I thought, I would have to restart the development or encounter the money making problem.

I could assume that it won’t be simple and start with a more sophisticated platform, with more flexibility and freedom to do what I wish but that leads me to a steeper learning curve.

This is sort of the chicken or the egg problem. I don’t have any experience with watch design and software to figure out if it will have some complicated bits.

I am very thankful for all the comments so far.

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Veertulia, Where are you located and how many in your team? I clicked on your symbol to see your watches. Are there other designs under different names?