Introduction: Dupe Culture Legal Background: Comparative Advertising Law Dupe advertising is a form of comparative advertising – a practice that involves brands comparing their products to those of their competitors. These advertisements may reference competitor products directly, either by name (“compare [product being advertised] to [other leading product]” or “if you like [competitor brand], you’ll […]
Background: Color Marks Traditionally, registered trademarks in the United States could only be logos, brand names, and slogans that were found distinctive and capable of serving as source identifiers. Courts maintained that color is inherently generic and therefore incapable of being distinctive or acting as a source identifier. The Lanham Act broadened the definition of […]
My father subscribed to the New York Times and Daily News. When I was growing up, I read his copy of the Daily News. In Junior High School and thereafter I added the Times. This has been a great way to start the day for me ever since. At least until recently. Today, the news […]
Introduction This blog post examines an ongoing legal dispute over access to publicly available internet data between HiQ Labs and LinkedIn Corp. First, it recounts the facts and procedural posture of the case. Second, it describes the case law and history of the misappropriation doctrine, a legal doctrine that could prove decisive in the dispute. […]
Introduction Since 2015, Merck Mercuriadis has been telling investors that music assets were significantly undervalued and that music publishing was ripe for a remodel. The music publishing industry was born over a century ago and profits by acquiring rights in songs and collecting royalties. After nearly 200 pitch meetings, Mercuriadis founded Hipgnosis Songs Fund with […]
Judge John G. Koeltl of the District Court of the Southern District of New York (“S.D.N.Y”) handed a victory to the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts (the “Foundation”) when it granted the Foundation’s motion for summary judgment in a copyright infringement lawsuit. See Andy Warhol Found. for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Goldsmith, […]
In Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc., the Supreme Court voted by five-to-four to expand the government edicts doctrine for the first time since 1888. 140 S. Ct. 1498 (2020). The State of Georgia had claimed copyright in the annotations contained in its only official collection of law, the Official Code of Georgia Annotated (OCGA). Id. at […]
Do tattoos on NBA players’ bodies in a videogame infringe on a copyright owned by an exclusive licensee of the tattoos? Judge Laura Taylor Swain of the Southern District of New York says no. Plaintiff, Solid Oak Sketches (“Solid Oak”), is the exclusive licensee of five tattoos copyrighted by tattoo artists. Solid Oak Sketches, LLC […]
In 1718, the infamous pirate Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard, lost his flagship, the Queen Anne’s Revenge, after running it aground in what is now Beaufort Inlet, North Carolina. In 1996, Intersal, Inc., a marine salvage company, discovered the remains of the Queen Anne’s Revenge. North Carolina, the wreck’s legal owners, contracted with Intersal […]
The Second Circuit’s February 2020 holding in Castillo v. G&M Realty L.P., 950 F.3d 155 (2d Cir. 2020) provides not only an excellent means for understanding the operation of the Visual Artists Rights Act of 1990, 17 U.S.C. § 106A (2012) (“VARA”), but also offers an intriguing fact pattern replete with deceptive and vindictive behavior […]
Professor Hugh C. Hansen authored a blog post on the recent Supreme Court opinion Matal v. Tam for SCOTUSblog.com. The Court’s judgment on the trademark “Slants” case was announced on June 19th, 2017. Professor Hansen argues that the case is one of the most important First Amendment free speech cases to come along in many years […]
Last June, in Converse v. ITC, the International Trade Commission (ITC) found that Wal-Mart, Skechers, and New Balance, among others, could copy an athletic shoe design – Converse’s Chuck Taylor – because it lacked “secondary meaning” to consumers, and therefore failed to qualify for trade dress protection under the Lanham Act. In trademark law, secondary […]
