Warner Bros and Name Rights

[liquidstar]

Now I understand that no one has seen the contract. That being said:

My brother's wife is a Warner Bros. recording artist. Some of you've probably heard of her, but that's not important. What is important is that as a requested favor I bought the following domains for her before she was signed:

firstlast.com
first-last.com
mispelledfirstlast.com

And I built her a really nice website. Now, Warner Bros is giving me a hard time about parts of the site being up before it is approved. I basically said that it's my site, my design, and my deal leave me alone.

They didn't think that was a very good idea, and our now threatening to send a C/D letter to my ISP.

Is this just a threat, or is there something to this? Could they shut down my site even though I registered it before they even knew who my SIL was? The site and content are all mine. Her CDs and promo material do have the site address on it.

Any advice?

 

[liquidstar]

anyone?

 

[pljones]

If you explain the facts that you set out in your first post to WB, then this really shouldn't be an issue.

The artist is part of your family now, and you reg'ed the names with her consent (right?) before she was signed to the major label. Now she's signed, well...it's still her name, so you might consider posting some language at the bottom saying that the domains are authorized and controlled by the artist. You might also consider remaining as admin contact for the names but put them in her name.

 

[Mr Webname]

Originally posted by pljones
you might consider posting some language at the bottom saying that the domains are authorized and controlled by the artist. You might also consider remaining as admin contact for the names but put them in her name.

Of course her contract with WB might cause problems here, however I am NOT a lawyer.

 

[jberryhill]

"Now I understand that no one has seen the contract. "

Which, by mentioning that, indicates your understanding that it may or may not be controlling here.

 

[HOWARD]

It would appear that the only way that Warner Bros may have a say on your web sites is if the contract with your sister-in-law says that they do. Otherwise, it seems that they're taking a stab at making some additional money off of your sister-in-law's career.

 

[pljones]

Even if there is a contract, it is still the artist's name, and putting control of the names with her should resolve the issue.

 

[jberryhill]

"Even if there is a contract, it is still the artist's name, and putting control of the names with her should resolve the issue."

I would not at all assume that the statement above is a foregone conclusion.

One can easily envision a contractual term in which the artist assigns an exclusive right of publicity and promotion to Warner Brothers for the term of the contract, and revoking any prior authorization of same.

That is only one possibility. There may be others. The only way to obtain a comfort level would be to have an attorney review the contract itself.

The right to contract is very broad, and people are certainly entitled to agree to all sorts of things. If I were Warner Bros. and I were signing an artist, then getting an exclusive deal on publicity and promotion of that artist would certainly be one of the things I would be seeking to obtain. So, I would be sort of surprised if there was *not* some relevant language in the contract to that effect.

 

[liquidstar]

thanks for all the input, i'll check into it with an attorney

 

[dtobias]

I would certainly never want to sign any sort of contract that would give somebody else ownership of my name and meant that I couldn't use it without somebody else's permission, but I guess recording artists may be treated like indentured servants by their record labels these days.