Quote:
Originally Posted by dayold
I thought because I read it on as tag (...and was told by a salesman at a shop), that an All-Parts Fender lic. tele headstock shaped neck was to be used as a replacement for a broken fender guitar only and that you couldn't build you own guitars from these.
Lately there are 3 three threads that mentions a few builders using All-Parts parts to build their custom guitars...so is that legal or what?
The reason I'm asking is that I have the guitar building bug once again and do I need to pay a fee to use a fender headstock?
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In most states a surgeon can butcher you pretty bad, as long as he's warned you in clear terms, in writing, of the possibility he might butcher you.
A little hyperbole, perhaps, but these tags are to address the obvious collision between fantasy and reality: When Allparts, Warmoth and others were granted a license to manufacture these parts, it was supposed that these parts would in fact be used overwhelmingly to replace existing damaged or worn out Fender or Squier parts. Everyone on the scene today knows this is silly; the vast majority of these parts are used to build non Fender guitars or to permit an existing Fender guitar to morph into two guitars. But these licensees must carry on with the pretext they are selling just replacement parts. Very superficial pretext, mind you: The Licensing Agreement was written by some people from Fender and they wrote the words and phrases stupendously badly and besides they never should have granted these licenses in the first place. Fender's current crop of lawyers know very well they could go to court and would have a next to impossible chance of getting the Genie back in the bottle, so they will not sue to force these parts makers to limit their production to a fair approximation of the number of parts needed to replace genuine broken or used up Fender parts. AND. These License holders are afraid to sue to get court approval to make as many of these necks as they choose because they know also, the whole Licensing Agreement might be struck down and everyone else out there ( USACG, Guitar Mill and countless others ) would gain equal footing with the few companies who do enjoy the current advantages of these Licensing Agreements. Meaning, neither side is gonna ask a court to interpret these awful agreements and therefore we can speculate all we like, what they really mean.
What a mess. No wonder some guy in some shop is confused. This is like an onion; some of us have seen some of the inner layers but no one IMO really knows what the core of this onion looks like.