Dbrand no longer selling PS5 faceplates after Sony threatens legal action

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Selling faceplates for the PlayStation 5 seems to be a lost cause. Last year, a storefront called PlateStation, which was selling customized faceplates for the PS5, was forced to stop after threat of legal action from Sony. A few months later, Dbrand, known for their tech decals decided to get in on the market, by offering their own black faceplates called "darkplates" for the console, even going so far as to joke about the matter by advertising them and saying, "go ahead, sue us" to Sony. The latter took it seriously, as they've done just that. A cease and desist order was issued by Sony to Dbrand, which resulted in the latter being forced to remove their PS5 faceplates from sale; if you now attempt to visit the store page link for them, it redirects you to a list of news reports specifically about Dbrand taking the darkplates off the market.

Quotes from the letter were posted by Dbrand's marketing team to the brand's subreddit, with a breakdown of the incident from their point of view. Sony alleges that the shapes used on the darkplates infringe upon their trademarked PlayStation face button symbols. Dbrand clearly uses a cheeky spin on the PlayStation look by using the same square, circle, triangle, cross look: a cross-shaped skull and bones, a circular radioactive symbol, a square robot head, and a triangle with a rune in the center. That isn't the only issue with the darkplates, though, as further on in the letter, Sony's legal team mentions that "the two vertical faceplates has become exclusively associated with [Sony] in the minds of consumers, and has come to symbolize considerable goodwill", meaning they find the sale of third-party faceplates to be an issue regardless.

Quote from Dbrand:
While we strongly believe in the consumer's right to customize and modify their hardware with aftermarket components, your Darkplates are now a collector's item. You know what they say - you either die a Darkplates owner, or you live long enough to see yourself become the scalper.

In closing, fuck you and especially fuck Sony. Talk soon.

:arrow: Source: Legal document (courtesy of Vox Media)
 

MikaDubbz

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It's weird that Nintendo has never cared about this stuff given how much they go after fan content, yet you can purchase crazy different Switch shells from various outlets, and have been able to for years at this point, and there doesn't seem to ever have been any intent to shut them down.

Sony can fuck off with denying users from buying or selling custom faceplates. Especially when they don't even offer any of their own. Hopefully someone on aliexpress will fill the void and Sony will be shit out of luck at stopping them since they'd come directly from China where their threats of lawsuits hold next to no weight.

Edit: there definitely are plenty of faceplates available on aliexpress, making this move by Sony all the more pointless.
 
Last edited by MikaDubbz,

MrSandstorm

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Really? First Nintendo "innovating" with DLC for an online service, and one that by itself was already of questionable value, and now Sony throwing another hissy fit because of people selling weirdly-shaped plastic to fit their weirdly-shaped console? Damn, what a productive week in the corporate BS department.
 
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Kioku

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Imagine being Dbrand... The company who just does not give a shit and will troll anyone and everyone.. To aggro Sony like that, and then roll over at the first sign of trouble. How valid would a lawsuit be over plastic? Or were they selling faceplates with copyrighted works? No? Okay.. So, Sony is just the big bad playground bully.
 

pustal

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how are faceplates illegal? i mean there are faceplates for 3ds consoles for years, phone covers and so on, and a faceplate is just plastic so i dont think sony can stop anyone from making plastic plates that happen to fit into a ps5 console... unless they pust ps logo on them i dont see any grounds to forbid anyone imo.

switch has so many custom stuff to buy like buttons and covers and shells and whatnot and now sony doesnt want to allow ps5 to be costumizable?

im guessing they really want to sell those special edition ps5 consoles down the line where the only difference will be faceplates.

If I am being a pedant. Most not quite patent, not copyright and not trademark but still intellectual property laws (design right, registered designs, design patents and so forth depending upon where you are) make a distinction between functional and non functional parts. Buttons for controllers would be a functional part, and shells in a great many cases (hah) would be as well but that also gets more fun -- sometimes shells are functional (cooling, inherent part of strength*, damage protection) but sometimes they just look cool (as might be the case here, certainly their language appears to reflect that).

*see in normal design circles the difference between monocoque wherein the shell notably adds to/constitutes the strength of a design and conventional frame + "basically there to keep the rain out" skin.


Ask your lawyers to take on Chinese company and "hahahahahahaha" will be the result, possibly with a consultation fee for that as you are clearly stupid and will probably pay it. Somewhere in there is probably also the quality issue of most such parts as well.
Ask your lawyers to put a boot to the neck of somewhere else that is based in (haven't checked these guys but fair bet) and deals in first world markets and different game entirely.
You also have the deterrence factor for when another company wants to try it on. Though I am still at a loss for what they are deterring and why they care to deter it.
You can't really patent this because it's
a) too simple for a patent;
b) a faceplate is nothing new;

If you could, you couldn't have third party parts sold in the car industry, as an example.


This is like a SLAPP suit, a frivolous litigation or litigation threat meant to intimidate them to quit in face of legal costs that'd be way to big for a small company like Dbrand.
 

EduAAA

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im pretty sure microsoft does less spying than facebook, google, twitter, apple, etc
And you are pretty wrong. The NSA knocked on Microsoft's door, and Microsoft was the company that collaborated the most.

Almost every PC in the world use Windows OS
 

Esdeath

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love how they basically design it so 3rd parties could easily make custom cover and then they say no, like putting a bowl of sweets on the table only to deny it when the kid asks for it
 

CeeDee

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I'll tell you what I really think it is. The PS5's design is iconic because it's got that white-on-black look to it. Sony wants the PS5 to be distinct. Dbrand making black PS5 plates muddies the brand or some shit, so Sony tries to scare them off with no real good basis. I don't think there's any real grounding in "Dbrand makes plastic the same shape as our plastic" so it's really just a lame scare attempt.
 

RedBlueGreen

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Imagine being Dbrand... The company who just does not give a shit and will troll anyone and everyone.. To aggro Sony like that, and then roll over at the first sign of trouble. How valid would a lawsuit be over plastic? Or were they selling faceplates with copyrighted works? No? Okay.. So, Sony is just the big bad playground bully.
Basically. Companies like Sony count on people caving to threats of legal action regardless of whether Sony has a case. This is a company that only kept their online store up because it got out that when the servers go down and the CMOS battery dies you can't play any games, and it affects both PS3, PS4, and allegedly PS5, which even has a digital only version that'll become a paperweight. There's no way they haven't known about that issue for years.
 

RedBlueGreen

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I do wonder what this company was thinking trying to aggro the beast that is Sony.

It never occurred to them to ask permission?
They don't need permission and Sony has no case unless they get the most retarded jury on the planet. They arguably had a case with going after PlateStation5.com or w/e because it's super close to their own trademark, but going after Dbrand is asinine.
 

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