Friday, December 30, 2016

The last 2 days of 2016

It seems unimaginable how fast 2016 has gone.

There have been many trials...and many triumphs over this past year.

I have learned a lot about myself and my life.

But still, it has gone so fast.

I sit here this morning contemplating my goals, wishes and motivations for 2017.  

Quotes from great people come to mind in the direction that I want to go. 

I'll share those with you later....

For now, enjoy a photo of peace.

 
Ps...we had a SUPER white Christmas here...with new snow every couple of days, our total snowfall was about 17 inches.  It was pretty "warm" yesterday with temps rising to about 24 degrees F so a couple of inches melted.  It has been a long time since we have had so much snow.  
It has been glorious and my upper torso will be fit for spring with all of the shoveling that I have done!



 

Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Master of chaos

I have decided that I have another gift.

I am the master of chaos!  

From Friday night through Monday afternoon, I managed, at one point or another, 
9 adults~including myself...and I didn't have to put myself in time-out either!, 4 grandbabies under the age of 4, a 4 month old puppy who is not yet house trained, an old dog, a cat, 3 horses, sleighing behind one horse, sledding with one grandchild after the others left, preparing and serving food, a shopping trip out for stocking stuffers (we call it the Dollar Tree Shuffle where we all meet at the same time and buy each other a gift to place in our stockings~it's a hoot!), 2 meals out, shoveling snow, giving baths, playing games, reading stories, organizing a ginger bread house decorating session, family photo's, presents and movie watching!

It was loud and crazy and wildly wonderful!
I am blessed!

I hope your Christmas was everything you had hoped it would be!

Hugs
XXOO

Thursday, December 22, 2016

The Dolly House at Christmas (2016)

It has been SO much fun preparing my personal collection of babies in the Dolly House for Christmas!

I took 130 pictures of them!  

 I will post some of my favorites/overviews here and leave a link to Doll Fan where I posted ALL of the pictures.  The blog takes forever to load the pictures plus they are smaller in size and need to be clicked to see full size, but are already full size in my post on Doll Fan and, you do not have to be a member of Doll Fan to view them.

Find the link after the few pictures I post here  :)

Welcome to a Dolly House Christmas!






























MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!

Monday, December 19, 2016

Christmas break!

I will be on Christmas Break from now until December 28th.

I will be taking holiday photo's of the babies in the festive Dolly House later today...



 For now, enjoy my Christmas critters!

 Ruger; 9 yrs old, Norm; 8 yrs old and Scout, 11 years old


 Yuumei, age 4


 Deuce, age 13




 Ella Mae, a sweet little pup that I am fostering over the holidays.  

XXOO


Friday, December 16, 2016

eBay's VeRo program and how it works regarding trademarks

You may have heard of the program  "VeRo" by now if you have had the opportunity to do any reading up on the situation with the trademarked words Reborn Baby Doll that I posted about a couple of days ago.

I was not aware of VeRo before this week.

I've gone to eBay to copy and paste exactly what it is:

 

How eBay protects intellectual property (VeRO)

We're committed to protecting the intellectual property rights of third parties and to providing our members with a safe place to buy and sell. We created the Verified Rights Owner (VeRO) Program so that intellectual property owners can easily report listings that infringe their rights.
We require that a rights owner be registered through VeRO before reporting items to us. Rights owners sign legally binding documents when reporting items to eBay.

*********************
Note that I highlighted in red that last statement.  I believe it is an important statement in the cause to shut down the claims of infringement violation from  Amy Duncan Wilson.

Here is how a person registered in the VeRo program goes about having auction pulled for intellectual infringement:


Overview of VeRO

eBay developed the Verified Rights Owner (VeRO) Program to help protect not only intellectual property, but the consumer as well.
Highlights of the program include:
  • Expeditious removal of listings reported to eBay by more than 5,000 intellectual property rights owners
  • Proactive monitoring and removal of listings that violate eBay policies designed to prevent the listing of infringing items on eBay.
  • Ability to save searches and have the results emailed to you
  • Suspension of repeat offenders
  • Cooperation with rights owners seeking personal information on alleged infringers
Because intellectual property owners are ultimately responsible for protecting their intellectual property, and eBay isn't an expert in an intellectual property owner's rights, we need your help in identifying listings that you believe may infringe your rights.

How to report a listing to eBay

If an item or listing infringes on your intellectual property rights, you can report the alleged infringement by submitting a Notice of Claimed Infringement (NOCI) to eBay's VeRO program. 
 The NOCI is located here.
You can complete the NOCI by filling out, printing and signing, then emailing/faxing the completed form to us. Once your initial report has been processed, we will provide you with information on how to submit additional reports, if necessary, through other electronic means.
eBay's VeRO Program may be contacted at:
By email:
 By fax:
  • (801) 757-9521
If you are unable to fill out the Notice of Claimed Infringement you can report copyright claims via a DMCA notification to eBay's designated agent by providing the following information:
  1. a physical or electronic signature of the person authorized to act on behalf of the owner of the copyright that is allegedly infringed;
  2. identification or description of the copyrighted work that you claim has been infringed;
  3. identification or description of where the material that you claim is infringing is located on the eBay site, with enough detail that we may find it on eBay's website;
  4. your address, telephone number, and email address;
  5. a statement by you that you have a good faith belief that the use of the material complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law;
  6. a statement by you, made under penalty of perjury, that the information in your notice is accurate and that you are the copyright owner or authorized to act on the copyright owner's behalf.
eBay's agent designated to receive claims of copyright infringement may be contacted as follows:
By mail
eBay's Designated Agent
583 W. eBay Way
Draper, UT 84020
By fax
(801)757-9521
By email
copyright@ebay.com
eBay has adopted and implements a policy that provides for the termination in appropriate circumstances of the accounts of users who repeatedly infringe copyrights or other intellectual property rights of eBay and/or others.

************************
Again I have highlighted in red an important statement.
Amy Duncan Wilson has had to physically submit an infringement for each and every auction and listing that has been shut down.  HER violation to those artists and her contract with eBay is that her ONLY trademark is on the three words put together and capitalized:  "Reborn Baby Doll".  Many, MANY artists have had their auctions and listings removed for using any of those three words, specifically "Reborn" which is NOT in violation of Amy Duncan Wilson's trademark.   

eBay did NOT do this...eBay was only doing what SHE told VeRo to remove...and remember, she signed a LEGALLY BINDING document with eBay.  To me that means that she needs to be HONEST in her reports to eBay.  
  
When artists write back to Amy Duncan Wilson through the generated emails they receive when their auctions and listings are canceled, Amy Duncan Wilson responds with something like, "You can relist your item just do not use the words "Reborn Baby Doll" as they are my trademark.  Hopefully eBay won't catch your words in their violation search."
 
Again, it is clear that she, through the VeRo Program is the one who activated the auctions listing removals based on any use of the words, not just all three words used together.

One artist in particular, Elizabeth Parks for her listing using the words "Reborn Doll".
Elizabeth has been in contact with eBay and also eBay's VeRo program and both agree that she was not in violation for the trademark "Reborn Baby Doll".

Both eBay and the VeRo program make these suggestions for now:

Break up the words "Reborn Doll" with something like:
"Beautiful Reborn Lifelike Doll"
 
or in another case this was suggested:
"Zach a reborn doll"
 
Notice that "reborn doll" is not capitalized.  The trademarked words are capitalized and "Baby" is added to it.  
 
Violations only occur to the words "Reborn Baby Doll" exactly written like that but it appears that Amy Duncan Wilson does not know what the parameters of her trademark are.
 
If you are a victim of action/listing removal and you have not "violated" the trademark 
"Reborn Baby Doll", please do submit a rebuttal through eBay so that your account is not tainted with a violation and so that you can get your reborn doll in front of the collectors who love them.
 
We are all going to hang in there....we got this!
XXOO
 
 
 

 
 

Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Trademark on "Reborn Baby Doll"

Two days ago the reborn doll industry was made aware of a legal USA trademark on the words
"Reborn Baby Doll"

Many people who had live auctions on eBay and listings on Etsy had their listings pulled in violation of the trademarked words.

My jaw is dropped to the floor just as much as yours is....how could the USPTO approve this trademark on a genre of dolls...a type of doll...a type of art?  
Obviously they did not do their homework.  

The owner of the trademark is Amy Duncan Wilson (Business name:  The Original Reborn), from Calhoun, Georgia,
not to be confused with Amy Wilson from Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, or any of the other Amy Wilsons in the doll industry.

I copied this information from a post in Doll Fan that was taken from the USPTO site.
It is the verification of the trademarked words:

 
-->
Word Mark REBORN BABY DOLL
Goods and Services IC 028. US 022 023 038 050. G & S: Ball-jointed dolls; Ball-jointed porcelain dolls; Ball-jointed resin dolls; Ball-jointed vinyl dolls; Doll accessories; Dolls; Dolls and dolls' clothing. FIRST USE: 20150426. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 20150426
Standard Characters Claimed
Mark Drawing Code (4) STANDARD CHARACTER MARK
Serial Number 86618275
Filing Date May 4, 2015
Current Basis 1A
Original Filing Basis 1A
Published for Opposition January 12, 2016
Registration Number 4991256
Registration Date July 5, 2016
Owner (REGISTRANT) Amy D. Wilson INDIVIDUAL UNITED STATES P.O. Box 812 Calhoun GEORGIA 30703
Disclaimer NO CLAIM IS MADE TO THE EXCLUSIVE RIGHT TO USE "BABY DOLL" APART FROM THE MARK AS SHOWN
Type of Mark TRADEMARK
Register PRINCIPAL
Live/Dead Indicator LIVE

Amy Duncan Wilson will send messages to artists who have had their listings removed and tell them that they can relist, just not using the trademark "Reborn Baby Doll" in their listing.

There are ways to get around this for now and there is a group of reborn artists working together on behalf of all reborn artists to reverse this trademark.  

For now, we can use any combination of the three words, just not all three of them together at the same time...the tragedy of that is with the hundreds of listings, neither eBay nor Etsy has the time to weed through the listings to look for just the three words used together so an auction or listing can still be pulled with the use of even just the word "Reborn".  But we can try...for now.  

PLEASE READ THIS:
I know that many people are angry and upset...justifiably so BUT...
that anger needs to be channeled to the right avenues to help our community overcome this situation.

PLEASE DO NOT CONTACT AMY DUNCAN WILSON IN ANY WAY.
Here is a copy of a plea to the reborn community via the gals that are working non-stop to reverse the trademark:

   Please do not message, comment, call or harass Amy D. Wilson, The Original Reborn her husband, or their businesses in any way shape or form. Please do not share her photos, her auctions, her photos of her or her family. We (Stephanie S Tackett Bobbi Barfoot and I (Debra Jadick ) are currently working with an attorney. By continuing to harass her it will only make our jobs harder. We are a vast community one that is passionate about what we do. With that comes a lot of hot passion and words are said that can not be taken back once posted. Screen shots are taken etc. If you want to help please sign the petition and please donate to the gofundme account.  If you need to vent please do so privately to a trusted friend. We assure you we are working extremely hard to have this matter settled. We are in talks with ebay and etsy as well. This is not a sprint ladies and gentlemen this is going to be a long marathon. Thank you all for coming together to better this community and For your support to keep what we have all worked hard for! 
Debra C. Jadick, Stephanie Stephanie S Tackett Bobbi Barfoot 

I have signed the petition and will be donating to the cause this morning.  

Here is where YOU can sign the petition (which is a statement to show just how many of us in the industry this trademark affects).
If you read the entire text associated with the petition, you will learn of the several ways that the trademark was issued under false pretenses.



There are already attorney fees associated with this fight.
We are a large community and if we all pitch in even a little bit, the expenses will be quickly covered.  There is a GOFUNDME account set up for this fight and I encourage you to give so that we can get this trademark reversed and get our industry...both on the artist side and the collector side...back to its regular functioning.


In order to not re-invent the wheel, so-to-speak, 
Debra C Jadick on Facebook will be updating her page on the progress of the trademark reversal, the information and advice from the attorneys and other basic need-to-know items.  I ask you to visit her page for updates.  I will share on the blog when big things happen but for daily news...

 
 With that, I pray for peace for the day.







Tuesday, December 13, 2016

Just for today....

There is a concerning matter in the reborn baby doll industry today but instead of focusing on it
I choose instead to share Liling!

A new body has arrived for Liling that I have not put on him yet, and I am currently rooting his hair.

Liling has a full, anatomically correct male torso.

As his work in progress I am quite pleased!








Maybe tomorrow we will talk about a "Trademark" by Amy D Wilson on the words Reborn Baby Doll.

Wednesday, December 7, 2016

A little studio fun

Sometimes I am drawn to the studio at odd times of the evening, so the other night I dressed these two in Christmas attire and snapped some photos.  

These are the only two babies I have to offer for Christmas.

Demetrick
(Vinyl Denver Rose by Marita Winters)
He is such a sweet, sweet little boy!









and Sweetie
(FBS Prototype "Smiling Sitter" by Kellie Beckett)

Wouldn't you like to find her in your mailbox??




She takes time out to stop and smell the Christmas flowers!



 



Both of these babies are priced at $650 plus shipping.  

Contact me if you are interested!

tngun05@gmail.com

Merry Christmas!