On Legal Protection Of Fictional Characters

As the development of modern Medias and the improvement of the Entertainment industry, the famous fictional characters,such as Laogen Liu,Yanzi Xiao,Superman,Xiaoyao Li and so on,impress us deeply as the moment we watch TV,see movies and play games on Internet. Although the commercial value of fictional characters means a lot than the works itself,the existing legal rules provide little to them.In this field of theoretical study and practice, America sets up a better example to us.This paper divides into five chapters.The first chapter will briefly introduce the abuse phenomenon of the three fictional characters,"Laogen Liu","Sanmao" and "Altman".This part will also introduce the purpose of the paper,the actuality of the topic.The second chapter talks about the the definition of fictional characters and the necessarily of special legal protection of fictional characters from the point of view of the value of law and the object standard.The third chapter sets forth and evaluates U.S.A legislation design of fictional characters. U.S.A sets up a type of so called "cross-protection means".The copyright law,the trademark law and the law against appropriate competition provide protection to fictional characters at the same time.Although U.S.A design is advantage at current stage,the short backs are self-evident.The forth chapter involves in establishing Chinese legislation design of fictional characters.I hold the view that we should provide different measures according to different utilization of characters.When characters are literary used,they can be safeguarded by copyright alone.When they are commercially used,it is necessary to introduce "merchandising right" into our country's legislation.The fifth chapter is the conclusion.