Tuesday, October 14, 2008

The Carlos Confusion

Many sellers on eBay list similar artists in the title of their listings to expand their search range as sort of a...if you like this artist you will like this artist.

I listed this item on eBay.
180290559691 - Wendy Walter Carlos Beauty in the Beast LP 1986 VG++

Vero removed the item because it is in violation of intellectual property rights according to Serendip, LLC. eBay told me to contact Serendip to find out why it was removed from eBay.

Serendip's response was simply, "The artist's name is Wendy Carlos, as clearly shown on the LP."

Now not only is Walter Carlos a similar artist to Wendy Carlos but they are the same person but I guess different enough artists according to California Civil Code Section 3344 so you are not allowed to sell any Wendy Carlos merchandise under the name Walter Carlos.  Someone could have been polite enough to contact me and I would have changed the listing but instead the listing was removed from eBay via Vero and now my compliance to eBay Powerseller Regulations are failing.

I did a little bit of my own research and according to Wikipedia, "In 1998, Carlos sued the songwriter/artist Momus for $22 million for his satirical song "Walter Carlos" (which appeared on the album The Little Red Songbook), which suggested that if Wendy could go back in time she could marry Walter. The case was settled out of court, with Momus agreeing to remove it from the CD and owing $30,000 in legal fees."

So in honor of Serendip, LLC removing my listing from eBay for reasons I am not quite sure I can entirely wrap my head around, I am now proud to present to you for your listening pleasure, Momus: Walter Carlos!

1 comment:

Dirty Donny said...

Wow, is this for real?
I checked out the song too.
great post.