Design copied?

Russinating

Russinating

Russinating

Soldato
Joined
27 Dec 2005
Posts
17,317
Location
Bristol
Few of you may know of a watch company called Mr Jones watches. I found them about 3 years ago and liked their small range at the time (and the fact that I am Mr Jones). About 2 years ago I emailed the owner with a design idea I had that I mocked up when I was bored one evening. He replied to my email and said it was great although he already had far too many ideas of his own just not enough time.

Anyway 2 years later and they've released a watch that's pretty similar, both in name and design. The main difference is the face colour though that's not exactly a massive thing to change. I have no idea if it's similar enough for me to be angry, although I can't help but feel I provided a little bit of inspiration!

I wouldn't want to sue the bloke but if it is indeed similar enough to warrant such action then a free watch wouldn't go amiss :p.

Anyway, what do you guys think?

My design two years ago, sent to them (and received acknowledgement):

jmGdp.jpg.png


Their watch, just released, called 'Satellite' (mrjoneswatches.com/satellite):

zXlo9.jpg
 
Also, this is from my original email that I sent describing it:

The watch is based on three rotating discs - hours, minutes and seconds - around the central MJW logo. The discs are marked with a coloured circle which denotes the position (and so time) of each disc. The colours have been chosen to represent Mercury (Orange), Venus (Blue) and Earth (Green), the three orbiting planets closest to our sun. Alongside this the disc orders have been changed - that is, the outer disc is hours, the middle disc seconds and the inner disc minutes. While providing a unique alternative to the standard order it also represents an orbit visually, with the middle disc rotating the quickest.
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And from their email promoting it...

The watch has an unconventional arrangement of hour and minute hands: the slow moving hour marker sits outside the the minutes. This was inspired by the movement of celestial bodies: the more distant a planet is from the centre of mavity the longer it's orbit takes.
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platypus said:
I'd say they've pretty much copied your design, but given the length of time elapsed he may be able to argue that he can't remember where his inspiration came from, especially since you sent it 2 years ago. It could be a perfectly honest mistake.
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I'd imagine that's probably a fairly accurate timeframe give or take a few months for initial design to build and final production?
 
Jambo said:
Not really. He gave them it.

Why did you send them it?
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Because I thought they might like it and make it and give me some commission or at least a free watch. In my original email I say "...but if you're interested in using the design or basing another watch on this concept then I'd love to chat!"
 
Not that I'm aware of but of course that doesn't mean there aren't. I didn't copy the concept if that's what you mean, I just thought of it randomly.

I think my idea of changing the order of the H/M/S to represent an orbit is perhaps more original and copied than the actual basic aesthetics. The one above for example, based on the size of the dots I assume still has minutes on the outer ring.
 
Well folks, he's replied already having only emailed him about 10 minutes ago! I obviously stirred something but I'm not one to go around suing people anyway, and his response seems genuine, believable and I doubt my design is both unique enough and similar enough to warrant any actual legal anyway.

His reply for those interested:

Hi Russell,

Thanks for your email, I confess I had forgotten about your design (at least in my conscious mind - perhaps somewhere it had lodged in the subconscious!)

Really with Satellite my starting point was to try and make a better dawn west dusk east. On dwde the colours are supposed to represent the changing colour of the light over the day, however as it uses a 12 hour mechanism this is somewhat unsatisfactory (the hand makes two revolutions per day).

We mocked up a 24 hour dwde, but it was simply too difficult to read the time, so I thought to combine it with Cyclops. This was still hard to read (a single handed 24 hour Cyclops I mean), so we added in the minute hand.

So by a circuitous route we reached a similar point to your design!

As a gesture of goodwill for the (subconscious) inspiration we'd be happy to offer you our "friends & family" discount of 20% on any of our products - just let me know if you'd like to order anything and we can send you a discount code.

Kind regards

Crispin
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No free watch but 20% is something :p.
 
Yeah Cyclops was one of their first watches and I did indeed use their image of the strap and metal surround that they use and just changed the face and concept.
 
Raymond Lin said:
Taking away the photos used because the watch design itself belongs to Mr Jones anyway..................I think OP needed to clarify that in the first post, it read like you designed the entire watch and did the CGI for the whole thing but in truth is the opposite. Don't get me wrong, it fits very nicely but the original post makes no mention or given credit for the existence of the current design that was used and in production at the time.
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Yeah sorry, I didn't mention it because all their watches have identical surrounds and straps so it didn't cross my mind to, but of course I didn't link to their website either!
 
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