Comments on: Dueling Caskets (full of Doritos!)

By: Heather

Heather — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 23:01:54 +0000

Your Doritos commercial made sense and was way better! When “Casket” aired during the Super Bowl, I was really confused and had to rewind it three times. It just wasn’t funny and didn’t make sense to me. How did such a lame commercial make it onto national television?

By: Killface!

Killface! — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 22:29:04 +0000

Not surprised. You can always count on the most religious people out there to be the biggest hypocrites.

By: Whiz

Whiz — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 20:44:27 +0000

omg, if this were an iceskating dispute they aren’t the same routine even given similar elements

By: anonymous

anonymous — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:52:32 +0000

Some of these comments just go to show how screwed up our legal system is. People who spill hot coffee on their laps jump at the chance to file friviolous lawsuits. But a person with a clear, legit problem is told don’t waste your time. Even though they didn’t win a big prize, doesn’t mean you couldn’t collect damages. That church clearly has money and so does Doritos. The church ripped you off and Doritos benefited from that. They are both liable.

Talk to a lawyer. They will probably jump through the roof when you tell them you want to sue a megachurch and Doritos. They will see dollar signs and probably offer to help on a contingency basis. Plus it would be a very, very high profile case. Too bad Johnny cochran is dead. That’s the kind of guy you need right now!

I don’t think you should give up on this so fast. This could be a very important case. The internet is like the wild west when it comes to copyright. Everyone thinks they can just steal whatever they want. You should be able to upload a video to youtube and not expect to have it ripped off. If people actually started fighting back then we’d all be better off.

By: Jared Cicon

Jared Cicon — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 04:27:35 +0000

@ Joel Levinson
I second the talented Jew’s point(s). I think in the end you will find yourself even more damaged than you are now….wether or not you prevail in court.
Jared aka The Video Contest King.

By: jj

jj — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 01:37:33 +0000

sorry to hear you were ripped off by some baby scientology… stick with it. we feel your pain!

By: Joel Levinson

Joel Levinson — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:35:27 +0000

Long story short, a few things:
1) Don’t get a lawyer, it’ll be a waste of money and energy.
2) Don’t give it any more thought. It will be a drain on you personally and creatively.
3) Don’t post rough drafts or storyboards again.
4) Remember that a big part of video contest entering is getting fucked by the people who run contests. Any of us who has entered more than 5 has been screwed in some way or another, and until we form a union (which would never work by it’s nature) we are subject to their laws with little recourse other than to stop buying their products and bad mouth the companies.

Best thing for you to do is forget it and get back on the horse and make more great videos. You have great ideas and you produce great stuff. Just take it as a compliment and move on.

If you want a more detailed response, read on-

Don’t get a lawyer, you don’t have a case. I understand why you are upset, and I believe they probably stole it from you, but it would be all too easy for them to argue both videos are parodies of a long tradition of American stories about faked death, dating back to at least Mark Twain (and probably beyond.)

Similarly, the same way you noted that many videos had bathtubs full of doritos, they would argue that caskets full of doritos was an idea multiple people had. I’m sure they could point to almost any single gag from the contest and find multiple examples of people using it in their entries.

Lastly, the video didn’t win the million. Whatever you got from the contest in either press or cash would not be worth the amount you would have to spend on legal fees to get it.

By: tre

tre — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:34:29 +0000

Looks like you have a slam dunk here. Give ‘em hell.

By: Dan

Dan — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 20:21:46 +0000

Madhatter,

I’ve exchanged a bunch of e-mails with Fritolay lawyers and they’ve never thrown the contest Terms of Service agreement in my face. I’ve entered a ton of contests and it seems that those kind of statements are only there to scare people. According to the law, you can’t just assign someone your copyrights by clicking a button. After all, who actually knows who clicked the button? My rights trump a bunch of small print. They can SAY whatever they want in their rules, but that don’t make it so.

Also, even if that block of text did assign ownership of all entries to doritos, the team that made the other Casket ad are not covered by it. After all, I suspect that they ripped of my storyboard video which was not entered in to the contest. So if they stole my idea they committed for-profit copyright infringement which is pretty serious deal.

By: david rorie

david rorie — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 19:08:46 +0000

don’t know if this will make you feel better or worse. but these guys hated the Casket ad.

http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/story/10-worst-Super-Bowl-commercials-0207210