By Chris Wright
Huge news! A three-year-old Mancunian boy by the name of Rooney Scholes (yep) has been denied a personalised Easter egg after Thorntons refused to ice his name onto the confectionery for fear of violating copyright laws.
According to the Manchester Evening News, the next-door neighbour of United fan Jo-anne Scholes, 43, asked for her son’s first name to be iced onto the chocolate ovoid as an Easter treat only for the staff at Thorntons in Bury town centre to refuse to write “Rooney” on the egg for fear of breaching copyright.
After quibbling for several minutes, the Thorntons staff agreed to ice the lad’s full name onto the egg, with “Rooney Scholes” apparently being much more agreeable from a litigious standpoint.
Jo-anne told the MEN:
“It’s just nonsense anyway. Rooney is his name, does that mean he’s not allowed to have his name on anything because he shares it with a famous footballer?
“It’s really annoying because it turned what was meant to be a nice, personal gift into something which looked really impersonal and just a bit silly really.
“It’s just pathetic that they wouldn’t let a child have his name on an Easter egg for fear of upsetting Wayne Rooney. I can’t imagine Wayne Rooney would care less.”
We’re fairly sure she’s right there and, as the MEN are keen to stress, there is no copyright or trademark protection for people’s names under UK law.
Told you it was huge news!
(Via Manchester Evening News/Image: MEN)