Steve Jobs Figurine
The Hong Kong based MIC (Made in China) gadgets. Was selling a Steve Jobs figurine made with incredible detail and likeness. SJ’s outfit is his classic trademark. The black turtleneck and Levi’s 502 jeans. You could even tell his pair of New Balance sneakers while standing on an Apple Logo platform. MIC Gadgets was contacted with a cease and desist letter from apple of California. Some web sites have stated that Apple is suing MIC Gadgets, but from what I can tell its only a letter asking them to stop.
From Apple: “Unauthorized use of a person’s name and/or likeness constitutes a violation of California Civil Code Section 3344, which prohibits the use of any person’s name, photograph or likeness in a product without that person’s prior consent…”
I am not even sure if a California law can be upheld in China. Maybe the Hong Kong legal rules are a bit different than mainland China. But Apple can not seem to stop all the iphone and ipad knockoffs that are in mainland China nor Hong Kong.
However the letter has scared them enough to stop selling the figurines at 300 units. They were selling for $79.90 USD with free shipping. The toy had gained much attention on the Internet, with many noting how the figure was holding the iPhone incorrectly, in the supposed (death grip) that causes signal loss on the iPhone 4. This issue did not hold back customers from purchasing the figure, which sold out completely.
M.I.C gadget apologized to Steve Jobs, and Apple.Inc for any inconvenience. For the full story and more pictures you can view them at the MIC gadget Site For now the Steve Jobs Action Figure has been taken off the market.
Does Steve have cancer again? After seeing photos of Steve Jobs at WWDC I am not the only one who wondered whether Mr. Jobs is sick again. I have stood next to him in the Apple cafeteria line, he is definitely a larger than life figure. You may say this is not really business news. In Apple’s case many billions of dollars of market value rests on Steve’s remaining healthy and at the reigns of Apple for many years. So his health is a very material business concern.