Luxury watchmakers are taking action against smartwatch face creators infringing copyright

Are custom smartwatch faces getting a little too realistic?

A growing number of luxury watchmakers, including Omega, Tissot and Mondaine, have taken issue with the volume of very accurate representations of their signature watches, being available for download across the web, for the benefit of Moto 360 smartwatch users.

Richemont, owner of blazoned brands like Cartier and Montblanc, has been sending cease and desist notices to several websites, as well as individuals presumed involved in the publishing of replica watch faces, on ground of copyright infringement. Many of these sites have been sent takedown notices as well.

Richemont is known to take the hard line on intellectual property. Recently, the company was successful in forcing ISPs in the UK to block websites selling counterfeit merchandise.

Swiss watchmaker Mondaine is also a company with a bone to pick. In 2012, Mondaine made headlines, as Apple was forced to settle for a $21 million lump sum, after it was determined that one of the clock faces used in iOS was identical to a design registered by Mondaine, and licensed by the Swiss Federal Railway Service.

Website owners at the receiving end of the takedown requests have been compliant, and have been taking measures to curb the uploading of copyrighted content.

While it’s difficult to determine how much damage the blatant imitation of a physical product can do to the owner of that design, and while the law may be open to interpretation, it’s not hard to see how watch faces may be dangerous territory, especially because they are not simply static: they are designed to be a functional representation of a watch.

Does this mean all digital content that resembled physical products is a target? Probably not yet, alas the evolution of wearable technology, which we are just beginning to witness now, might head towards very complex legal scenarios, with some very bizarre outcomes.