What is Intellectual Property?

A guide created in collaboration with the Content & Safety team regarding IP infringing content, what counts as IP infringing content, and what can be sold on Tebex stores in regards to this.

What is Intellectual Property?

Intellectual Property ultimately refers to content owned by another party. This content is usually trademarked, patented or copyrighted, so no one other than the owner has the rights to use or sell this content.

As Intellectual Property is protected legally worldwide, selling the Intellectual Property of another party goes against clause 1.4 of our Acceptable Use Policy. Using Intellectual Property in your FiveM server also goes against CFX’s terms, so it’s important that both we and our creators ensure this content is not being sold.

The most common examples of this are brand names and logos. The name ‘McDonalds’ is under a trademark, along with the iconic yellow ‘M’ as their logo, so this name or logo cannot be used by another party for monetary gain.

This applies to properties in all industries, including the gaming industry. As the likeness of ‘Mario’ is licensed by Nintendo, this model, or models depicting this character, cannot be directly imported into another platform and/or used for monetary gain.

Many things fall under Intellectual Property once these have been patented, but we’ll be focusing on names, logos and designs.

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What Can’t I Sell?

Typically, logos, brands, and product names are trademarked when they are created to prevent others from using them. To be on the safe side, it’s good practice to assume that logos, brands, and product names are trademarked.

This means when selling goods on Tebex, the sale of and references to existing brands or products must be avoided to help your store comply with our Acceptable Use Policy. If we find that any Intellectual Property is being sold on your store, we will raise this with you via email. If this content is not removed, we may decide to disable your store until the appropriate changes are made.

Changing the brand name slightly does not mean that you are complying with this clause. For example, changing ‘Mercedes’ to ‘Nercedes’ does not mean you are in the clear, as it is still evident that content owned by ‘Mercedes’ is being sold.

Examples of assets and goods that would fall under Intellectual Property.

When products are created, the overall design is usually trademarked, too. This may also include smaller sections of the designs, such as the shape of a bottle or the headlights on a car.

As an example, taking the design of the iconic Air Force 1 shoe and placing your own logo on a pair of these would still be classed as selling the Intellectual Property of Nike, as the design of the shoe itself is trademarked.

If you wish to sell goods inspired by an existing product, they must be created from scratch by yourself and be generic. For example, if you wanted to have energy drinks in your FiveM server, such as above, you can create your own version of ‘Red Bull’ and call this ‘Blue Cow’, or something similar. Providing the design of the can and logo is also different from the original ‘Red Bull’ design, this would be sufficient enough to sell on your store. We love seeing everyone’s original designs and creations, so have some fun with it!

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What Does This Mean for Cars?

Cars are our #1 offender regarding IP-infringing content being sold on Tebex. As mentioned above, we cannot sell anything with a trademarked name, logo, or design, so any vehicles sold on your store must be generic or lore-friendly.

This means there must be no trademarked badges on the vehicle, and the design must be generic enough to the point where it cannot be recognised as an existing vehicle. As an example, the badges have been removed from this vehicle, but it can still be identified as a BMW X5 due to the design;

Therefore, this product would not be supported on the Tebex platform due to this being the Intellectual Property of BMW.

A good way to test if the vehicle is too similar to an existing product is by using Google Lens. If results come up for an existing product or car, you may want to consider making a few more changes to the design.

Lore-friendly vehicles are permitted and can be sold on your store without any issues, you can find them listed here. Many recent releases in this forum are also approved by CFX, so it may be worth taking a look if you’re feeling a bit stuck.

Of course, you can create your own vehicles if you’re feeling inspired, but try to ensure the content is different enough from any licensed content you may be inspired by to avoid running into any issues.

To help ensure that Intellectual Property is not being sold using Tebex, when selling vehicles on your store any vehicles your customers will receive must be disclosed in your package descriptions. If your customers can choose from a selection of cars, they must be visible from the respective package(s) without joining a server or submitting any details, so anyone can view these. With packages where your customers can provide the vehicle, the vehicle they would like to import must be added to your description prior to purchase.

You can list these in your descriptions, add photos of these to your descriptions, or include a link to a YouTube video or document showing these. As long as these are visible and free from Intellectual Property, it’s OK with us.