So in the box below you will see an article from the Buffalo News about the "Ice Bowl". I"ll give my thoughts about it under the box as not to cause anyone who reads it to take my thoughts into account untill after they read it.


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Poster Art USA threatened over trademark infringement
NHL benches 'Ice Bowl' line
By Sharon Linstedt NEWS BUSINESS REPORTER
Updated: 12/23/07 6:47 AM


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The Ice Bowl poster featured a generic hockey player.
The National Hockey League has melted a locally created line of "Ice Bowl" products linked to the New Year's Day Winter Classic outdoor game between the Buffalo Sabres and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Facing NHL threats of prosecution for trademark infringement, Mark Corsi, owner of Poster Art USA on Elmwood Avenue, has agreed to halt sale and production of his "Ice Bowl" merchandise.

A source familiar with the situation said the NHL started with a "cease and desist" notice, and escalated actions when Corsi continued to sell the homegrown line of posters, T-shirts, hats, gloves and mugs.

NHL representatives did not respond to inquiries about the situation on Friday. Corsi is barred from discussing the situation under terms of the agreement.

In an October interview with The Buffalo News, Corsi explained he came up with the idea for the locally produced items in July on the heels of rumors the Sabres would play an outdoor game in January at Ralph Wilson Stadium.

"It was 90 degrees and everybody was talking about the Ice Bowl," Corsi said. "And nobody was calling it the NHL Winter Classic, it was Ice Bowl, Ice Bowl, Ice Bowl."

After consulting his attorney, the seller of new and vintage posters found "Ice Bowl" was not a registered trademark and quickly filed a federal trademark application. The centerpieces of Corsi's product line were a poster and T-shirt featuring a generic hockey player, dressed in a dark blue jersey, with gold trim, emblazoned with a gold "B."

Corsi said he took care to make sure none of his items bore direct references to the Winter Classic, or trademarked images of the NHL, Buffalo Sabres, or Pittsburgh Penguins.

When the items were unveiled, Sabres Chief Operating Officer Daniel DiPofipredicted Corsi was on thin ice, saying "any reasonable person will recognize he's referring to an NHL event." The Sabres front office declined to comment on icing of the "Ice Bowl" line Friday, calling it a league matter.

Corsi, who saw brisk sales of the "Ice Bowl" line out of his Elmwood Avenue shop and its Web site, opened a kiosk in Amherst's Boulevard Mall in November to keep pace with demand. Brian Calvert, the mall's specialty leasing manager, said the Poster Art kiosk remains open and has switched over to Buffalo-themed posters and other merchandise.

"I know [Corsi] was disappointed about what happened. It's too bad because the Ice Bowl products were really nice, but his regular products are also quite nice and he's doing what he has to do," Calvert said.

While Corsi, an Elmwood Avenue veteran, can't talk about the "Ice Bowl" meltdown, he has found an outlet for "silent protest." An officially licensed poster depicting the Stanley Cup is now hanging upside down in the window of his store at 1055 Elmwood Ave.

As the banned "Ice Bowl" line has evaporated, NHL-sanctioned Winter Classic products are arriving at local stores and the Sabres Shop at HSBC Arena. Jim Laux, of Laux Sporting Goods, said although the official products are expected to sell well, the timing is off a bit.

"It would have been nice to have them in sooner. We won't get the jerseys with the players names sewn on them on the floor until after Christmas," Laux said.

Sabres spokesman Michael Gilbert also said Winter Classic items have been on shelves only a few days but have been hot sellers since their arrival. In addition to the special white Sabres jerseys, the official product lineup includes thermal underwear shirts, hooded sweat shirts, caps and the fuzzy "Fargo Flap Cap."

slinstedt@buffnews.com





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My take is this. First of all the guy who runs Poster art came out with Ice Bowl Stickers, Hats, Shirts and posters before the NHL could. You have to give the guy credit for that. I still have not seen a single poster, from the NHL. "The Ice Bowl" was never officaly called that. He didn't use any terms that where trade marked like NHL, Sabres, Penguins or even any player names. He even invernted his own uniform. When I hear "Ice Bowl" I think of NFL football games from before my time. What the NHL is trying to say is that "ice bowl" = "Winter Classic". It doesn't and I think they are being greddy. It comes down to the fact that they are a huge comodity and this guy isn't. This has Big Business and the power they have to run over and try to put small ones out of business all over it. I'm not saying if I was in the NHL's position that I would be happy but that doesn't mean you go after the little guy. What things like this do is hurt small business. It also hurts the person who wants to do some thing creative next time cause what if he gets sued. I think that often big business forgets that everyone was a small business at some time. In terms of the name it should be clairifeid that the Winter Classic has two names not one. All the shirts say "Winter Classic" but it is sponsered by AMP energy drink and is also called "The Amp Winter Classic". If you follow the same logic can AMP Tell the NHL that they have to pull all the winter classic stuff and and the AMP Logo to it. Wait that sounds crazzy right well is that really any worse then worse then attacking a guy who breaks no copy right laws. Hey AMP paid good money to have their name on it. I'm still going to watch it cause I like both hockey teams. I just think that it is sad to see that the NHL doesn't have good Business ethics.

I won't know really what these pictures are untill the journal is posted. The reason is this new camera my mine. The Olympus was much more user friendly and the software was better also. You can't tell what the pictures are when they are saved to a disk and I can't find the pictures on my computer it puts them into the kodak software so I had to count out the pictures maybe these are the ones I was looking for. I went with the Family to the Cheesecake Factory and thought it was very good. I had some kind of Fettucini and this Godiva Desert that was very good. The reason is that I will be 35 on Sunday. I don't think I'm going out tonight even though I should. I think I'll watch the sabres game. I know I should go out after but I see myself staying in with my lame self.

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The movie we saw was the new Chipmunks. I thought it was funny and really enjoyed it more then i thought I would. Some of that might be because I'm a Jason Lee fan. Yes I did think they where a touch to much high pitched but it was still a fun movie to see.

Yesterday I saw I Am Legend. I admit I did like it. I don't know if there was a surprise ending or something after the credits that changes everything cause i couldn't stay through the credits. I like that it was sort of a zombie movie with out Zobies and had a good time watching it. That being said I would have liked it if there was more to it. What i mean by that is that if "God didn't do this we did" if that got more into the story and if there was a little more philosphy oh yeah and violence also. All in all a good movie.










I know that doesn't really show all of the place, but it does look pretty cool inside i think. Oh I hope everyone has a great rest of the weekend and a great Holiday and can at least maybe get some time off away from work. Hey unless you like work more then your family in that case I hope you have lots of work to do and stay away from your family. And yes there really are people like this and they do request to work the holiday for that reason, that doesn't mean that there are any (e:peeps) like that but if that is you and that is your thing go for it.

Do to the huge size and that I had to shrink them down and I need to go watch more football I only put up 5 pictures from last nights sabres game. I had a great seat I was in the first row of the 300s right on center ice. If you visit my webshots page you can see almost all of the ones from the game and warm ups. In case you didn't see the news it was a pretty big deal that Kane (plays for the blackhawks) is from Buffalo. Before the game they had this face off with his family on ice that was pretty cool. Kane scored the first goal and I think get the first penality also but not sure about that. In the end the sabres won and got an empty net goal also. I had a great time and it was a fun game to watch. Monday night I'm going to WWE RAW and hoping that my camera problems are over. I just hope that these pictures come out as prints ok but we shall see. I also need to figure out at how many mega pixels I should take pictures at so they will upload here and on webshots. Hope everyone has and continues to have a great weekend.

So for those who have been reading my blog you may notice that I have not had a lot to say. Well some of that is not having anything to say and 2nd is that I have had bad luck with cameras. Yesterday or today was going to be the day that I put up a bunch of Pot Luck pictures. That currently and most likely will never happen. When I got home I took two pictures of my place. Next day I went up to walgreens and followed their instructions at the photo machine and I got an error that said I removed the media, but I did what it said so I tried again and still no luck even with help from someone I know and he said that there was some type of other file or program on the card that was interfearing with getting the pictures. When I put the card in the camera it asks me to format or use a different card. If I format it by, by pictures that aren't backed up, I couldn't even download it onto the computer. So for now I have a new memory card that I'll try out at the sabres game tonight and then try downloading them first and see if that works. I'm wondering if a photo place would have some way to get the pictures off the card and ignore what ever else is on there. I have no idea how anything else could have got on there other then maybe the card got damaged somehow at walgreens.

The pot luck itself was a good time, it really was. I hope someone or multiple people are eating the left overs of the cake I brought, and anything else that is left. All the food was very good that I tried. I really liked the Vegatrian Lasagna I some times don't like it. I admit I'm really don't like the one wine I tried and the wine I had wasn't my thing. I'm not saying it wasn't good wine just not my thing. But I also didn't get to try the stuff that looked just like grape juice. The white stuff was very good and kinda tasted like white grape juice. It was nice to see (e:jason) there. I have not been to the other dinners so I can't compare but it seems like there was a pretty good turnout. Oh when I mentioned (e:jason) I wasn't saying it was good just to see him, there where a bunch of people it was good to see. I just haven't seen him at an event in a long time.

Today started out great I was going to the Bandits Open Practice. I was then going to post pictures on Webshots a few here and maybe a few on myspace. Well those pictures won't be posted or at least not by me. After the practice they had an autograph session. That would have been better if I was on the same side as you entered the field from I was until and security guy sent me to the other side. Then later on there where lots of people on that side. But at least it gave me a different view. I should have gone over there half way through it, oh well what can you do. Both before the practice and after I took some what I thought where great pictures the the area around HSBC and The Aud. This includes some interesting sky pictures. So as I heading to get a bus I was rushing I should have just took my time. When I got on my bus and it pulled off no Camera. I was on cement the entire time so if it would have fell I would have heard it. I think the guy behind me may have slipped a hand into my pocket and taken it. The part that sucks is that if it was my other jacket pocket the second it was gone I would have known and a fist fight with everyone would have started. The part that sucks isn't the camera, a camera is just a camera and is only money. It is the pictures on the memory card I care about. Well maybe with some luck the pictures will get posted some how. Maybe the guy will sell the camera for money and the person who buys it on the street will be a bandits fan or fan of Buffalo and post them some place. I doubt that will happen. In any event it sucks. That part that sucks the most is knowing if I took just a few more pictures of Downtown Buffalo after the game then my camera wouldn't be gone. Or if I got a better or worse spot in line then I would have left at a different time and got different results. It sucks knowing that if I would have done any one little thing a little bit in a different way than it would not have happened. I recently bought a New Camera because I got one for a Christmas Present but it has the wrong kind of batteries so I decided that since my camera is pretty beat up I might need a new one soon so I kept it for myself. I just thought I would drop it again and that would be the last drop it took. I didn't expect to lose it or have it stolen. It sucks losing those pictures. I wonder if someone stole it if they would be dumb enough to sell it to a pawn shop. There is no way to check them all anyways. It is also possible that I thought I put it in my pocket but missed to. The thing that is ironic is that I just mentioned on (e:paul)'s journal that around this time of year you have to be more careful cause crime goes up and then it happens to me. It is also Ironic that If i was robed that I was wearing Bandits gear at the time. Not really much I can do but hope someone honest has it and decides to look at the pictures and then finds me through a web search. If that happened I would pay them so I could get it back and get the pictures processed. The thing that really makes this entire thing odd is that my sis is in NYC and was going to use my Camera and I was going to test out the new one for the game but then she got a camera that is easyier to use. So I wonder if she would have used mine and I used the new one if it would have got taken. I kinda think not as it is smaller and not shiny since it is black but who knows. I guess I'll test out the new one at diner at (e:pmt)'s this week. I still just want to scream ARGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH it is just more frustrating than an angry feeling. Maybe that person needed it more then me, but I don't know. Oh yeah sorry for the long paragraph that I don't know how it would be multi ones. Hope everyone has a better weekend then I did.