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Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

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Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#101

Post by krageon »

avhon1 wrote: post #41
krageon wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is about protecting the consumer, because it prevents a million "grana padano alike cheese product " type products, like you'd get in markets where these rules don't exist.

If it were merely about preventing deception, your example would be illegal just because of the deliberate de-emphasis on the word "alike". A cheese-buyer with poor eyesight could reasonably look at the packaging and think it was something it wasn't. A different ( more consistent?) typographical design on the same product could be reasonably expected to communicate that it is an imitation product, and what it is an i…

It's about preventing deception, you are clearly wrong about the measures that would be taken because in fact the measures are different. Just because you don't agree with the form enforcement takes doesn't mean that it has to conform with why you think it would take the form that it does.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#102

Post by iguy »

woofie11 wrote: post #82
bzb6 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The licence being the fundamental part to protect the livelihoods of those who live in the region producing these valued products. But I guess we should outsource the production of this cheese to China instead, right?

... more like European old wealth. There are land-owning European families whose wealth and power date back half a millennium. Most of these valued, recognizable products are mostly produced on land and capital owned by those families.

I think it's more the reverse. It's important to the wealthy Parisians that the traditional regional produce continue to be made. If the people in the village all gave up & got factory jobs, then hundreds of specific cheeses (etc.) would cease to be made at all, and not be available at any price for their table. So they have made sure this doesn't happen.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#103

Post by dole »

CaptainZapp wrote: post #96
weare138 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a lawyer here either but this situation appears pretty common overall. Do a google search for 'KFC recipe' and there's no shortage of sites showing you how to make KFC style fried chicken, many using an alleged leaked list of ingredients. It just seems if it was illegal they wouldn't be able to do that but again IANAL and this is based on observational conjecture. Maybe it being a foreign company under differ…

Why anyone would ever go through the effort of wanting to make KFC style chicken at home really eludes me. To each his own, I suppose.

I tried last year. The Colonel’s big secret is white pepper, IMHO.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#104

Post by kps »

xuhu wrote: post #48

We need an urban dictionary for trademark names. Search for Grana Padano there, then go to Youtube and search for Grainy Po Valley Cheese.

This existed for typefaces back to the hot metal days, because like PDO the names were legally protected but the styles were not; e.g. Palatino (Stempel/Linotype) = Book Antiqua (Monotype) = Palladio (URW) = Zapf Calligraphic (Bitstream) = TeX Gyre Pagella.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#105

Post by Asooka »

avhon1 wrote: post #68
MakersF wrote: post #43

I think it's important to notice that the point is not to keep how to make the cheese secret. The recipe for the cheese is actually encoded in the law, and you can download it freely ( https://www.parmigianoreggiano.com/it/consorzio-disciplinare... , in italian). During lockdown I was trying to make a regional cheese, and the law was the best recipe I could find, with extremely detailed steps. I think they are trying…

> trying to discourage the usage of "something style" naming The law prohibits exactly this. From the Wikipedia article [1]: [Under Protected Geographical Status laws] it is also prohibited to combine the indication with words such as "style", "type", "imitation", or "method" in connection with the protected indications [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographical_indications_and_t...

But that should only apply to products, not to video titles describing how to execute the recipe, right? Otherwise I guess you could title the video "how to make cheese using the official recipe for Grana Padano, with the understanding that this will not result in Grana Padano cheese"

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#106

Post by FriskyAlter »

chii wrote: post #51
Reelin wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is about protecting the consumer Nonsense. Protected origin status is protectionism plain and simple. That's not to say whether it's bad or good, just to call it what it is. Proliferation of confusing low quality lookalikes is prevented by having an enforced criteria and associated labeling requirements. (If the text is too small as in your example then either the labeling requirements aren't sufficient or they…

> low quality lookalikes and if the low quality is really as low quality as claimed, consumer would stop buying it. But if the "low" quality is actually great quality/good value for money, then consumers will buy it - regardless of the naming. Using law to prevent competition is worse for the consumer.

Why have any protections then? Let the invisible hand of the market rule everything.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#107

Post by s_dev »

_jal wrote: post #87
avhon1 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> trying to discourage the usage of "something style" naming The law prohibits exactly this. From the Wikipedia article [1]: [Under Protected Geographical Status laws] it is also prohibited to combine the indication with words such as "style", "type", "imitation", or "method" in connection with the protected indications [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographical_indications_and_t...

I expect to see a video on "How to make edible dairy product that is absolutely nothing like Grana Padano" by the weekend.

"I can't believe it's not butter"!

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#108

Post by SeanLuke »

SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #91
apexalpha wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that there are always others who will piggyback of your product to boost their own sales, while not maintaining the quality standards that led to the name recognition in the first place. In California they also sell "Californian Champagne", some legal quirk allows it. There is no problem with their wine, it's fine wine (the one time I had it). It's just NOT Champagne. That doesn't make it bad wine, but…

> In California they also sell "Californian Champagne", some legal quirk allows it. It basically depends on the trade deal. Anywhere in the EU, "Champagne" has a very definite geographic meaning involving a region in France. Likewise "Feta" cheese, "Port" wine etc etc. But elsewhere it depends on the nature of the deal with the EU. E.g. Western Cape, South Africa makes good sparkling wine, but the EU flexed muscles i…

In the US, most feta is incredibly made with cow's milk. So no, the US doesn't have strong protection there.

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#109

Post by iso1631 »

op00to wrote: post #75
krageon wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't use "the consumer will stop buying it" type arguments, there are so many examples in real life where you can see trash will absolutely be bought (mostly by people that don't know the world could be not trash). It is a bad faith argument.

If they like their knockoff cheese who cares?

People who don't realise its a knockoff. Both the consumer and the producer loses out. This isn't like copyright and patents, trademarks are there for protection of the consumer as much as the producer

Re: Cease and desist for video on how to make “Grana Padano Style Cheese” [video]

#110

Post by arrrg »

lb1lf wrote: post #86
bzb6 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is, because they would be unable to sell it in the first world.

They can sell it, but the PDO ensures they have to find some other way of gaining market share than piggybacking off the reputation the products they imitate have earned over the years. (Which, in fairness, equates to being unable to sell it if other people shop like I do - nine times out of ten I pick cheeses (to stay with the original example) I already know.)

I would be so happy to find Parmesan that‘s not named Parmesan, just for some more diversity. For example, I would prefer to avoid animal-based rennet if at all possible, but there is no real diversity in cheeses with a Parmesan-like flavor profile made with microbial rennet (I know of one such cheese and while it’s ok it’s also no amazing) and as far as I know Parmesan (actual Parmesan named Parmesan) with microbial rennet doesn’t exist.

There are probably hard-cheeses out there that have a Parmesan-like flavor profile and are made with microbial rennet but they are fiendishly difficult to find. The one I found I only did find because it markets itself explicitly as a Parmesan alternative with microbial rennet. But beyond that? And I can totally understand why cheese makers are reluctant to jump into that market if they can’t market themselves as that thing, even if they were perfectly capable of making that thing.

Overall it’s a difficult Problem to solve with no easy outs I can see.

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