The Trademark Bullies

In the modern age of corporations and copyright laws, it seems that just about everything has been legally claimed to some degree. With language and art, these claims often take the form of copyrights: companies who have established a successful symbol or brand name often go to great lengths to keep them distinct - form a company or product with too similar a name, or borrow too much from their famous logos, and chances are you’ll have some charges filed against you. Yet at times it seems to get ridiculous, with corporations attacking anything that resembles their trademarks or refers to them — it is in these situations, that trademark battles can be crippling to innovation and communication.

The Wall Street Journal article, New Tool In Trademark Fights, shows how these trademark disputes can often be one-sided and illogical. For Phil Michaelson, a cease-and-desist letter was received due to his usage of the commonplace word “keep” for his website KeepRecipes.com - AdKeeper Inc. claimed that the ability to save recipes to KeepRecipe’s online cookbook by clicking on a “K” for “Keep” was a blatant trademark infringement. In another case, Bo Muller-Moore, a grassroots t-shirt designer in Vermont, was sent a cease-and-desist letter by Chick-fil-A for his t-shirt slogan “Eat More Kale”, claiming that it was too simliar to their slogan “Eat Mor Chickin”. Yet Bo Muller-Moore’s t-shirts stand for a very different cause and represent a genuine support for healthy, locally-grown foods - more of a grassroots movement as opposed to a ploy to start a kale-oriented fast food chain and leech off Chick-fil-A’s success.

Both Phil Michaelson and Bo Muller-Moore have turned to the Internet for solutions. Michaelson posted the cease-and-desist letter on a website, where it was noticed by a group of entrepreneurs and passed along to their lawyer, who offered to represent Michaelson free of charge. Muller-Moore meanwhile, has created a Facebook and online petition that is drawing the support of thousands, which now even includes the governor of Vermont. By adding a donate button to his website, he has been able to raise funds for legal support if the case ends up in court.

These techniques of “shaming” a company online in order to make them back down have been gaining in popularity with the growth of social media and online services. The goal is simple - to prevent the overreaction of large corporations from crippling smaller companies that may not be able to afford legal battles. In certain cases it has proven to be extremely effective, like the two mentioned above, as it puts a lot of pressure and attention on the corporation, and lets them know that there will be consequences for carrying out a lawsuit. As Wendy Seltzer states, “Trademarks are meant to protect your image, so it doesn’t really help to look like you’re coming down hard on the little guy”.

I’m definitely a proponent of this new development. As the article states, the success of online shaming is mainly reserved in cases when it is quite clear that the company is overreacting in order to protect their trademark. AdKeeper was quite clearly overstepping its boundaries, and Chick-fil-A has completely misconstrued the purpose and significance of Bo Muller-Moore’s t-shirt designs. In cases such as these, a public voice is most effective - if corporations become too entitled to their rights, going so far as to claim basic ideas of design and language, then their coveted ideas and symbols will instead be branded with negativity.