to think the Olympics have no right to ban the words "summer" and "London"?!!

[motherofallhangovers]

"Olympics organisers have warned businesses that during London 2012 their advertising should not include a list of banned words, including "gold", "silver" and "bronze", "summer", "sponsors" and "London"." source.

And they're actually going to police this!

"Almost 300 enforcement officers will be seen across the country checking firms to ensure they are not ... illegally associating themselves with the Games"

WTF?! I feel like I've just wandered onto the set of the satire "Twenty-twelve", it's so farcical.

But no, this is real!

Whatwillsanta - perhaps you could explain that to the petty officials who ARE harassing perfectly innocent people and organisations. The Olympic organisers can pretend it's not their fault all they like, the fact is people are being bullied thanks to their corporate bollocks. And yet more taxpayers' money is being wasted.

Yeah go Jins. I'll back you up in the sad face photo wearing my Yolympics tshirt.

I'm helping organise a summer sports day at my local play centre (a charity), which is timed to coincide with the Olympics. The obvious name for it is "[play centre] Olympics fun day", but apparently as we're charging entry, as it's a fundraising activity, this is Not Allowed.

What are the realistic chances of having the arse sued off us? We're in a host borough, which no doubt makes the crime even more heinous.

Quenelle
While I agree with you in principle, I am not sure that I would be willing to risk a £20k fine to test it.

But there isn't an automatic fine is there? You are only fined if you don't 'cease and desist' aren't you?

I appreciate I may be being a little idealistic. But I'm always up for a bit of civil disobedience. We should do more of it in this country.

They have to do cease and desist first though don't they? Surely they can't go straight to a fine?

LOCOG can enforce civil penalties - so

1. damages - which would mean they have to prove they had suffered a loss (no such thing as punative damages in this country, thank God!)
2. account of profits (so unlikely that the local Brownies would have to hand over anything)
3. injunctions - i.e. specific court orders to get you to do or stop doing something (eg stop putting your bagels in an Olympic ring, take down that sign)

There is also a criminal offence but this is limited basically to putting the Olympic rings on your merchandise and selling it (but there is a defence to this in that you believed (genuinely!) that the use of the Olympic branding was not an offence in these circumstances. So this is really designed at catching the people flagrantly trying to cash in by flogging "Olympic" merchandise that isn't official. You can get a fine on summary convinction of up to £20k. This doesn't mean you just get sent a fine - "summary" means you get tried in a magistrates court so its not like a speeding ticket.

Last time I looked, there is still the principle of innocent till proven guilty in this country.

What annoys me is that there so much hype surrounding this issue (egged on by the media who seem to be desparate to see the Olympics as one big disaster) that no-one is paying attention to the details, like, er, the actual law!

Arse. Can't spell desperate. (After thirty plus years of trying).

The 1948 (British) Olympics made a profit of £29k for this country, with no sponsorship. A lot of people are getting rich this time around, to the detriment of the general population (double-dip recession anyone?) and a good majority of us outside London do not give a flying fuck about an extended PE lesson, fuelled by BigMacs and Coke.