Model deleted by Admin?  

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

I had one of my models deleted today too, am also looking for someone to contact. Funnily enough, mine was also car related (a phone dock for android auto in a 2016 Honda civic).

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

Hi all. 

It's quite disappointing to see my first ever published print deleted as well. 

I see no reason or explanation on what was wrong with it and there was no comment except your "print was deleted by administrator". 

I'd also like an explanation, please. Also, admins should consider spending a moment writing an explanation as users do take a lot of time to publish their prints and this behaviour is ungrateful to say the least. 

P.s It also happens that my upload was an automotive part as well (a rubber grommet for a specific application).  

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

Mine was also for a Honda Civic too funnily enough. It was a dash vent model.

I have some other models in the automotive category that are still up.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

I too lost a model.  Do a search on honda and see how few prints are returned....

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

I hope, that car manufacturer like Honda didn't went the Lego way, as we have seen in the past on thingiverse.

To force-request that everything that has it's copyrighted name must be deleted irrelevant of what it is.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

Prusa is going through many issues from website to model database to printer quality. Best bet is to use reputable sites like thingiverse, thangs etc if you want to load free models for others to download (or perhaps hope for some 'tips') or you can do a web-search for paid model sites (I wont list them here becaue they dont sponsor me 😉 ) but easy to find if you want to sell your models. 

Prusa models are usually just duplicated models from the reputable sites but you limit your market substantially and, as you have seen, you dont get good support from Prusa. Standards at Prusa have slipped poorly in the last year or so.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

@dontbuyprusa: we generally say: "you did it in slices" when too much is too much.

DISCLAIMER:

I am not and will never be an employee of Prusa Research unless they offer me 100K € gross per year. I have friends who built the printer starting from a wooden frame ... that says a lot.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

@funcoolio "you did it in slices"

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

They got back to me by email and said that yes Honda had asked all models to be removed. However I think that is pretty ridiculous. Honda does not own my model that I created of a part that doesn't even 100% match theirs. It makes very little sense to me.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

This is Nintendo's approach to pretty much everything as well. The lawyers see it as protecting their IP, but to everyone else they just come across as over-bearing fart waffles.

I think it would be completely legitimate to post it again while avoiding the use of Honda trademarks. I know that will make it harder to discover, but at least if someone does find it who needs it you'll help them immensely.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

I'm definitely going to post it again, just not here. I had somewhat recently moved off of Cults and Thingiverse because of various reasons and was hoping I had found a home here but I don't think so now. 

The funny part to me is they only did this based on titles. I have other parts posted with tags mentioning the banned phrase or mentioning it in the description. It seems to be a title issue only. So if someone does want to repost their stuff put it in the description or tags and it is still searchable.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

It's even worse than that, they removed any model at all that had the name "Honda" in it, regardless of what it was. 

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

I had a model removed that mentioned Honda as well. This is ridiculous. It is not any sort of legal violation to reference a "Honda". I going to assume that, like my model, that no reasonable person could be confused by these descriptions into thinking that we are claiming that they are products produced by Honda. In my case, it was a model that fits a particular spot in a particular model of Honda vehicle. Honestly, this is making me less likely to purchase a Honda again in the future.

I'm also disappointed that Prusa caved so quickly to this ridiculous request. At the very least they could have contacted us and given us the chance to remove the word "Honda" from our models before unceremoniously deleting them. Heck, you could have complied with Honda's request by converting the models back from public to private until the problem was better resolved. (Granted, _locking_ in them in the private state would have required a code tweak.)

There are a _great_ many models on here that are described as "does some useful thing with/for commercial product X". Are we all going to have to start using secret code in our descriptions? "This is designed to work with a pickup truck that rhymes with Nord Eff Won Thrifty". Sigh.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

I do think "don't shoot the messenger" should be applied here. Prusa doesn't have much choice if company lawyers send them takedown requests.

I mean you could go the "Fillenium Malcon" way and try to re-upload the model as "adnoH whatever" or contact Honda (nicely) on different social media channels and ask what's going on and why fans of their cars are not allowed to publish accessories. I'd guess it's just some lawyers running wild as they do sometimes with the company not knowing.

@dontbuyprusa I do like your sarcasm. "reputable sites" - ha - are you one of the guys who gets paid per download and had to sign an NDA to not talk about that kind of "sponsorship"? Also do you like getting visitors? Because when a site does not remove EXIF tags from images, it's not that difficult to find out where designers take photos of their Thangs… 🙂

As for duplicate models on Printables - if the original designers imported them over from Thingiverse, because that site is - let me find nice words - unmaintained and unusable, there will of course be duplicate models…

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

Incredible history of the Honda brand that cannot be used. In Japan Honda is a surname like Ferrari is in Italy, what will happen? Will I no longer be able to call my wife by surname unless I pay a royalty?

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

Hey everyone.

This is the first time we were threatened by lawyers of such a big company. They sent us a huge legal document covering every single model they want to be deleted, with an annoying lawyer talk explanation of how they hold the IP and patents even to stuff without a honda logo (e.g. the shape and dimensions of a washer fluid cap).

There was a very tight deadline within which we could respond. We did the only thing we could, without getting into a huge law fight with Honda, we complied. 

I want to apologize to everyone who was affected by this and got a model taken down. We're now trying to reach Honda directly to bring these models back. These models are not permanently deleted, but "hidden", we have the ability to bring them back. I suspect Honda might not even be aware this is happening, just a big law company doing "something" so they can bill the hours.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

If the laywer language didn't forbid it, could you publish and write about it in some prusa blog ? Just interested there...
It would be interesting, if news-media would pick it up.

Posted by: @mikolas-zuza

Hey everyone.

This is the first time we were threatened by lawyers of such a big company. They sent us a huge legal document covering every single model they want to be deleted, with an annoying lawyer talk explanation of how they hold the IP and patents even to stuff without a honda logo (e.g. the shape and dimensions of a washer fluid cap).

There was a very tight deadline within which we could respond. We did the only thing we could, without getting into a huge law fight with Honda, we complied. 

I want to apologize to everyone who was affected by this and got a model taken down. We're now trying to reach Honda directly to bring these models back. These models are not permanently deleted, but "hidden", we have the ability to bring them back. I suspect Honda might not even be aware this is happening, just a big law company doing "something" so they can bill the hours.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

I wouldn't poke the bear too early. As Mikolas said, Honda might not even be aware what's going on and adding public pressure would not help with finding a solution.

RE: Model deleted by Admin?

Is someone from Prusa able to provide details on the legal documents you received either here or directly to any of the unfortunate people (not me) who were affected by this?  It would help them if they wish to see if the claims have any merit and/or to pass it onto their own lawyer for possible action against the H-word.  Perhaps time to contact the EFF.