Selling projects that are based on someone else's plans? Legal or illegal?

[KingwoodFan1989]

Unfortunately, my truck was stolen early Saturday morning and recovered, although I do owe some money for the deductible for getting it inspected and repaired. Thus, I'm in need of extra money, and in addition to some other things I can sell, I have two tables that I built for my on-campus apartment back in college. I don't need them anymore, though, and they've just been sitting, so I've been thinking about selling them. However, they're based off of the Cherry Nightstand on the New Yankee Workshop. The only difference is that instead of Cherry and Curly Maple, I used White Oak and Figured Walnut. I also think I made the legs an inch or two shorter than Norm did, but other than that almost everything is to within about 1/32" of the plans.

I think I read about this topic in a copy of Wood Magazine, but I don't want to dig through my copies just to find that part, so I thought I'd ask about it here. Is selling a project based on someone else's plans okay? I don't even care if I make any profit over what I paid for the materials. I just need to get some money for them, especially since I don't use them anymore.

[Boatman53]

My feeling is sell them for whatever you want. As I understand it you made them for yourself and used them, thus satisfying any royalty or plans fee. They are now used furniture. No worries. If you made many of them just for sale then you should owe a royalty for each one sold.
Jim

[Superglide]

99% of the time. No problem. But if it is high end stuff, it could be a problem. I started a project once, and was threatened with a lawsuit.

[KingwoodFan1989]

What qualifies as high end?

Also, I did try e-mailing the New Yankee Workshop last night, but the only address they have is for orders, and when I sent my e-mail, it got rejected as spam or something like that. Thus, I'm not sure if I can contact them about it. But it does make sense what you said, Jim, about how it's used furniture now. I do think I want to briefly sand the tops, put 4-5 more coats of finish on, and then polish the finishes back up. The gloss isn't as high as it used to be, and there are dents, scratches, cup rings, etc. from when people used them at college. I also didn't do a good job on the drawer guides, and so I'm going to saw them off with a flush trim saw, sand the surface flat, and put on new ones. I also think I'll make them adjustable via oval-shaped slots since wood movement has sometimes tightened the fit of the drawers in the past.

[jteneyck]

I think you should take a bow for even wondering if it's legal to sell them w/o paying whatever fee may be required.  My next thoughts are the same as Boatman's.  Different story if you intend to make dozens of nice new ones and sell them. 

John

[KingwoodFan1989]

Haha, thanks! I actually haven't seen anything that positively FORBIDS me doing this, but I can't help but see a similarity between this situation and laws that have to do with copyright (i.e. music, movies, etc.). Still, it does make sense what you and boatman said. I think just to be safe, though, that I will just sell the tables for about an equal amount to the cost of the materials they're made of. That way no net profit will happen.

[ianab]

Some very specific plans, like boats, houses etc, are basically a "licence" to build one. If you want to build more, then you buy another licence, which might be discounted if you don't need another physical plan. But I would imagine that any plan with that sort of licence would have to have some wording to that effect included. 

But even in that case, once you have purchased the plan, and built the item (boat?) it's then yours to do with as you wish. No one is going to sell (or more to the point BUY) a plan with the condition that you have to keep the item for the rest of your life, and can never sell the item. 

Other thought is that the stands in question are probably pretty generic? May have been "reverse engineered" from some existing classic piece of furniture anyway, and there are 100 similar plans in circulation already? In that case it would be hard for the publisher to assert any real copyright over the plan as the original design isn't their own work.  Hence you can't "copyright" a conventional rectangular table, it's a generic thing. You can sell a plan for making one of course, but there is nothing unique about the completed table. 

Now if the plan was for a specific new "design", that might be able to be licenced in the same way as music or text is, and the same way a unique boat or house design is.

[MauleSkinner]

Haha, thanks! I actually haven't seen anything that positively FORBIDS me doing this, but I can't help but see a similarity between this situation and laws that have to do with copyright (i.e. music, movies, etc.). Still, it does make sense what you and boatman said. I think just to be safe, though, that I will just sell the tables for about an equal amount to the cost of the materials they're made of. That way no net profit will happen.

Unfortunately I don't believe that whether or not you make a profit is factored into it...if it's illegal to build and sell for profit, it's illegal to build and sell at a loss or break-even.

Fortunately, as others have said, I don't think there's an issue here, as you built and used them, and now you're simply selling off your old furniture.

[daddo]

Prove to me you built them.

[Admiral]

Sell them, no problem from a legal perspective, you are overthinking this.  You are not producing multiples of the design and offering them for sale.  You are selling used furniture, period.

Where someone would have a problem is if they advertised large production of the design, and even then, the producer would make slight modifications to obviate the issue.


EDIT:  oh, and sell them for true market value, i.e., the most someone will pay; profit has nothing to do with it.