Photo: WeChat
National Games authority threatens companies with legal action
Many Chinese businesses and social media platforms, including a gay dating smartphone app, may be infringing upon the intellectual property rights of Olympic Games organizers by using Olympic symbols during the Rio Games.
A viral screenshot of a post on Blued, a smartphone app developed exclusively for gay social networking, reads, "We wish athletes, or your dream husbands, a complete success. Blued is with you as you watch the Rio Games this summer!" The post was illustrated by a picture containing the phrase "Rio 2016" and the Olympic emblem.
The Olympic-themed picture had been replaced with the Blued logo when the Global Times logged on to the app on Tuesday.
"We have begun to delete or hide posts that are Olympic-themed, feature Olympic trademarks and contain Games imagery," Geng Le, CEO of Blued Technology Co, told the Global Times on Tuesday. Geng said Blued made this decision following popular social media platform Sina Weibo's removal of some posts thought to be in violation of copyright rules.
"A lack of official rules has confused us about whether mentioning words and phrases such as 'Rio 2016' is acceptable in online discussions of the matches," Geng explained.
Other companies had yet to realize that they may be infringing on the intellectual property rights of Olympic organizers and corporate sponsors as they flooded their social media pages with Rio-related pictures and logos.
"We can't use it for free? The Internet is swarmed with such pictures," an anonymous employee of Beijing roast duck chain restaurant Dayali's marketing department said in surprise when asked by the Global Times on Tuesday whether the chain was authorized to print Rio Games emblems on its takeout promotion cards.
Wang Qian, an intellectual property rights professor at East China University of Political Science and Law in Shanghai, told the Global Times that businesses that are not official Olympic sponsors cannot use any Olympic emblems, symbols or signs for commercial purposes or to suggest an association with the Games. This includes using words like "Olympics" and "Rio 2016."
Commercial use of the term "Olympic Games" is also forbidden on social media platforms, unless posts are confined solely to discussing Olympic events and matches, Wang added.
Rio Games-related insignia, however, seem pervasive both online and offline. The 2016 Olympic emblem has also reportedly illustrated hot pot takeout ordering app Taotailang, promotional materials for tile manufacturer Monalisa Tiles, and posters for the as yet unreleased movie Suddenly Seventeen, which is directed by famous Chinese film director Zhang Yimou's daughter.
In a statement issued August 3, the Chinese Olympic Committee (COC) urged non-sponsor businesses to stop employing Olympic imagery in advertisements, developing products for the Olympics and making use of the Olympic Games countdown, medal tallies and special reports.
Companies that break copyright rules will be investigated by the legal representative of the COC, the statement said.
