• Business & Career Building

  school use question

  Posted by Craig Lindvahl on November 14, 2006 at 7:59 pm

  My sixth grade students are working on their own :30 commercials. It’s a creative thinking exercise. The best one or two may be shown at a local student film festival.

  Here’s the question: for a use like this, would they be okay using real product names like Pepsi, etc., or should they use fictional names?

  There are tickets sold for the film festival, and dvd’s of the festival are offered for sale. All of the other student work is carefully vetted for copyrighted footage, music, etc., but I’m not sure how to address this question.

  Thanks very much.

  Craig Lindvahl replied 19 years, 6 months ago 2 Members · 2 Replies
• 2 Replies

• 

  Mark Suszko

  November 14, 2006 at 8:41 pm

  Fictional. Not just for possible legal reasons, but if you really mean this to be a creative exercise, letting them ape or leverage exisiting brands and their marketing strategies and identities is not as creative or educational as it could be. There’s more work in defining something all-new from scratch than re-defining an existing item. Plus, if the work is good, it becomes useful portfolio material for them later.
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  Craig Lindvahl

  November 14, 2006 at 9:04 pm

  Thanks for the response. Obviously, I’m not allowing them to use existing marketing strategies. I play the president of the company when they pitch their ideas, and I tell them I’m not paying for something that we’ve already done as a company.

  I was concerned about the legal side of things, and your response makes perfect sense.

  Thanks again.

  Craig Lindvahl

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