Category: Footwear

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Cases Footwear Intellectual Property

The Other Shoe Drops

Photo courtesy of Reinhart Julian (Unsplash Photos)

The fashion industry has debated the effect of the Supreme Court’s 2017 decision in Star Athletica, LLC v. Varsity Brands, Inc., interpreting the Copyright Act’s rules for registration of two and three dimensional designs incorporated into useful objects, on the availability of copyright protection for fashion designs and accessories. There now appears to be an emerging consensus of finding copyright protection in circumstances where it might not have been previously expected. This is hardly surprising. What is surprising is that the Court’s decision may be impacting a key question that the Court side-stepped.

While Star Athletica resolved that an otherwise copyrightable design that is a part of a useful object could be the subject of copyright so long as it could be conceived independently of the object in which it was incorporated, the Court pointedly refused to decide whether the cheerleading uniform surface patterns were copyrightable under the rules applicable to all two and three dimensional designs. Chief among those rules is the requirement of “originality”.

The breadth of the potential impact of Star Athletica is reflected in the recent decision of the Copyright Office to issue copyright registrations to adidas for the Kanye West Yeezy Boost 350 and Yeezy Boost 350 Version 2 sneakers. The application for registration as a two dimensional design and a three dimensional sculpture had originally been refused on the ground that it was a useful article. A request for reconsideration of the refusal was filed and registration was again refused on the ground that the “simple shapes arranged into common and expected pattern in very simple color schemes” did not meet the originality requirement.

But on a second request for reconsideration, the Copyright Office reversed itself, concluding that under the test of Star Athletica the two and three dimensional aspects of the designs could be “perceived” as separate from the sneaker, the useful object on which the designs appear.

It also decided that given the very low standard for copyrightability, the designs’ lines, stripes and swirls, although individually not copyrightable, had been combined in a sufficiently distinctive manner so that the designs, when viewed as a whole, merited registration. The copyrightable combinations, as described by the Copyright Office, consisted of “irregular black lines of various lengths and shapes on a grey fabric with a black semi-circle in the arch and an orange dotted stripe on an off-white heel loop” in the case of version 1 and “several grey lines in a wave pattern with a thick orange stripe on the outsole that fades toward the heel” with an inner orange layer that adds “intermittent orange coloring” in the case of version 2.

In light of the Copyright Office’s decision to register the Yeezy 350 sneaker patterns, at least in their contrasting color ways, fashion brands should now consider seeking copyright registration for their important designs containing any variation beyond the most basic, unvaried stripes.

Credit: Helene M. Freeman

Read other blog posts related to Star Athletica, LLC v. Varsity Brands, Inc. here.

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Accessories Footwear Intellectual Property Menswear Textiles

Perfect Fit – Part II

An interview with Simon Crompton, creator of the blog Permanent Style

Photograph Copyright © 2018 by Alan Behr

In my last post, I reported on my conversation in London with Simon Crompton, who runs the website Permanent Style (www.permanentstyle.com), which is devoted to the world of bespoke (custom-made) menswear. We discussed elements of style for men, but when the conversation moved to the topic of how a website proprietor protects his own intellectual property, Mr. Crompton had some decidedly pragmatic ideas.

Permanent Style is authored almost entirely by Mr. Crompton, who, last year, was finally able to devote his full professional time to it. The site features the latest developments in bespoke, from tailoring to shirtmaking to shoemaking, around the world. It is supported by advertising, and it also promotes its own limited line of products, from surprisingly stylish watch caps (ski caps) to Oxford shirting for readers to provide their bespoke shirtmakers. Prominent on the site are reviews of makers of bespoke clothing and shoes, with Mr. Crompton serving as live mannequin and photographer’s model throughout, reporting on each step of the process.

I asked Mr. Crompton what kind of legal protections he employs for his work. Because his writing originates in Britain and not the USA, he is spared the unique (and to those of us who have done it for clients or ourselves, often frustrating) requirement of registering his copyrights. His pragmatic view: “It isn’t as if it is a novel or song lyrics. Anything on the site obviously comes from me, and no one is going to run out and say I’m Simon, I wrote this.”

As for protecting his brand, he holds to an equally pragmatic approach: be first out, keep a solid reputation, and you win. “The site has been up just over ten years, and it is well-known. That’s a very good position in the world relative to others who might be trying to establish themselves.”

Mr. Crompton also noted a key advantage to prose authored in Internet time: “What I write is so fast-changing, and there is such a high volume of it that it’s not that easy to protect, but at the same time, there is not much virtue in somebody copying. I already have the biggest traffic. If someone were to start copying my articles, that would never generate much traffic for him. He would still have to attract readers and then subscribers by offering something different, and unless that should happen, I would always do better on search engine optimization.”

That goes to the heart of a key debate in copyright circles—what utility is legal protection in a world in which almost everyone can read just about anything, and anyone can publish just about whatever he or she chooses to write, on platforms from Twitter on up? Registering the copyright, to say nothing of suing to stop infringement, can look old-fashioned in the context of a business (and social-media) model that values “reach,” often by free access, and loyalty for the generation of revenue more than it does traditional legal protections.

In short, Mr. Compton is conducting a very contemporary business to promote many very traditional crafts. If by so doing he helps craftsmanship flourish, we can only commend him-even if the model depends more on lawyers reading about dressing well (and, we hope, attempting to do so) than on offering legal advice. When it comes to what we do, however, lawyers can only continue to recommend to their clients that they reach out and consult with their counsel whenever making important decisions about their intellectual property. If you do not make these decisions yourself, the marketplace will very likely make them for you.

Credit: Alan Behr

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Footwear General / Musings Intellectual Property Menswear Womenswear

#Influencers?

Social media influencer asking followers to like and subscribe

What do the Special Prosecutor and the New York State Attorney General have in common? If you answered fake social media accounts and social media bots inflating followers, likes, tweets and retweets, you would be correct.

At the end of January, 2019, Attorney General Letitia James announced she had reached a settlement with Devumi LLC, which she described as “the first in the country” to find that selling fake followers and likes on social media is illegal deception and using stolen identities from real people is illegal impersonation. The Attorney General’s investigation began under James’ predecessor in response to an article posted online by The New York Times on January 27, 2018, entitled “The Follower Factory”.  That article is the best source to understand the underlying facts.

Devumi operated a business through which individuals who wished to appear more popular and influential could purchase views on YouTube, plays on SoundCloud, endorsements on LinkedIn, as well as followers, likes and retweets on Twitter and other social media platforms. According to the Times, Devumi’s customers included the model Kathy Ireland, the former pro-football player Ray Lewis and even the Treasury Secretary’s wife. Engagement with the platforms was effected by using computer operated fake accounts, generally referred to as “bots”. In some instances, the social media personas of real people were “cloned” to create multiple accounts in multiple languages to create thousands of other accounts used to promote products or services, so-called “sock puppet” accounts. According to the Times, Devumi supplied customers with over 200 million followers, using 3.5 million accounts.

Reaction to the article was swift and resulted in Devumi ceasing operations when the publicity “caused a major decline in its sales”, according to the Attorney General. But Devumi is hardly the only entity or individual conducting similar questionable operations. A simple search for “Buy Followers” on Google will lead to links for many offering followers or likes for sale. The search is so common that Google has pre-programmed questions and answers related to the search as well as related searches targeted to specific social media platforms.

Fraud and deception related to influence on social media platforms are not limited to purchasing followers and likes. According to an article posed on-line by The Atlantic in December 2018, wanna-be professional “influencers” are also feigning sponsorship deals on-line to convince brands of their credibility as influencers—what the article aptly calls “faking it until you make it”.

While many athletes and performers have entered into lucrative endorsement deals with brands for many years, the influence they sell has been earned through a record of actual accomplishment in their professional fields. Roger Federer, for example, can endorse coffee machines and watches because he justly has earned fame based on long years of actual accomplishment playing professional tennis. The same cannot necessarily be said of professional “influencers” whose only claim to fame is an Instagram following that may or may not have been manufactured. So, when it comes to social media “influencers”, the watch word should be: let the buyer beware.

Credit:  Helene M. Freeman

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Accessories Footwear Intellectual Property Menswear Textiles

Perfect Fit – Part I

An interview with Simon Crompton, creator of the blog Permanent Style

Photograph Copyright © 2018 by Alan Behr

Readers of our blog have probably noticed my interest in custom-made clothing. There is a professional reason: because we represent so many different brands of ready-made clothing, wearing something more esoteric allows me not to show favorites.

For over ten years, Simon Crompton has been reporting online, in his website Permanent Style (www.permanentstyle.com), about the refined world of custom-made menswear—which, in British English, is known as bespoke (as in, asked for in advance). Mr. Crompton may be familiar to intellectual-property lawyers from his years of service as the lead writer for the International Trademark Association’s annual meeting newsletter—among other publications. I recently sat down with him at a café in London, and we talked about lawyers, protection of his own intellectual property and the finer things in menswear.

“I like the fact that lawyers seem to man the last bastion of dressing a little bit formally—because that’s generally what you want from your lawyer,” said Mr. Crompton, echoing the advice of the American tailor and author Alan Flusser. And he agreed on the reason: it is all about building a sense of trust. He hastened to add, however, that it is not about conformity: “All over the UK, and I’m sure it happens in the US as well, you see young lawyers outside of a pub on a Friday night, and eighty percent of them will be wearing a navy suit, white shirt and black lace-up shoes. It looks completely predictable. There is no expression of individuality.”

Bespoke, he explained, is about looking smart but in your own way: all fine tailors have a “house style,” but within what is typically quite a broad range, the customer in effect participates in designing what he will wear. Indeed, I had just come to Mr. Crompton from visiting my own London tailor, Henry Poole & Co., where I was able to plan a future suit as purposefully as a chef planning a meal: a gray pin-dot cloth in wool and cashmere. A peak or a notch collar? This time, the notch. Lining: abjure the bold prints for something more reserved, a contrasting gray pattern, but still quite unique. And a collared vest (called here a waistcoat)—because, as a transplanted New Orleanian, I still am not quite used to New York winters and because, to be frank, it adds a touch of style. That is what bespoke is all about.

Our next topic was dear to my editorial heart: I have delved several times on these pages into the mysteries of the necktie—that one item of a man’s workday dress that has absolutely no discernible function except to make him look better. It also relates to a very important fact about the male physique: a well-cut suit jacket forces the eye upward, to the neck and then the face. Having it pass along a v-shaped crop of chest hair does not support an impression of a man of consequence. “A suit without a tie can work sometimes,” Mr. Crompton offered, “if it is a very casual suit, but most times, it just looks as if something is missing.”

Indeed, although Mr. Crompton was wearing a dark green Neapolitan suit (by the tailor Ettore de Cesare) made of corduroy—that ribbed cotton cloth that is the winter-weight mirror to the informality of linen for summer—he was quite correct that it would have worked far less successfully without his blue woolen knit tie by Trunk Clothiers of London.

But what about those—relatively speaking—more casual days even lawyers are sometimes afforded? “I think it is important for a lawyer to try to master the art of wearing sports jacket and trousers,” said Mr. Crompton. His use of the word master was not an accident. Most professional men wear that outfit often; doing it in a stylish way, however, is a challenge to many. “Start off with Navy jacket and gray trousers and start experimenting slightly—with brown trousers and a different kind of jacket with subtle patterns.” In other words, make it stylish, but make it your own—even if every bit of it was purchased off-the-rack. Remember that bespoke customers also buy most of what they wear, from jeans to raincoats, ready-made.

And that is what bespoke is really about: doing it smart, doing it stylishly and most important, doing in a way not necessarily done by others.

In my next post, I will explore how Mr. Crompton looks to protect his own intellectual property.

Credit: Alan Behr

See post…“Perfect Fit – Part I“

Categories
Accessories Cases Footwear Intellectual Property Textiles Womenswear

A tale of red soles

Much has been said and written about Christian Louboutin’s iconic red sole brand. It has sparked endless debates about trademark law in various courts around the world, including in the U.S., France, Switzerland, and most recently at the EU Court of Justice.

Christian Louboutin began selling his high-heeled red-soled women’s shoes in the early nineties. The red soles gradually became a signature brand, somewhat comparable to the famous Burberry check pattern. The creator’s idea starts as a mere decorative design, just like any fashion design. But over the years, it gradually becomes a brand in itself because the public begins to perceive it as a source identifier even without any concurrent word mark on the product. Burberry registered its design as a two-dimensional trademark around the world; it recently sued Target in the U.S. for selling scarves with a similar design. As has been the practice of Burberry over the years, that is a trademark claim, not a copyright claim—which would present greater challenges to Burberry under U.S. law.

Back to Louboutin’s red soles: The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled in 2012 that Louboutin owns a valid trademark for his red sole shoe design. Louboutin had taken Yves Saint Laurent to court for trademark infringement. The red sole trademark was deemed inherently distinctive, Louboutin having given ample evidence that the trademark had acquired secondary meaning. Those words sound like music for the fashion brand owner and its lawyers because it means that the court rewards years of investments in sales, advertising and free publicity. (As the court duly noted, Louboutin shoes are popular items to wear when walking red carpet events in the entertainment industry.) Louboutin’s victory was unfortunately limited to the court having confirmed the validity of the trademark; the court also ruled that the same trademark registration could not be invoked against shoes – such as those sold by YSL – that are monochrome red, covering the insole, outsole, heel and upper part.

The U.S. thereby paved the way for Louboutin, which is, after all, a French brand. A long-awaited judgment in the European Union was recently rendered by the EU Court of Justice. This time, it was the Dutch discounter Van Haren that was selling red-soled women’s shoes. The court held, after a long debate, that a red sole applied on the sole of a shoe can be a valid trademark in the EU. Under pre-2018 EU law, the shape of an object that “gives substantial value” to the product itself could not be registered as a trademark. (An example would be the distinctive shape of the Perrier bottle.) The court that the color red, as applied to a shoe, was not as a “shape,” as Van Haren had asserted; after all, Louboutin had not sought to register a shoe but merely a color applied at a certain location on shoes. Following the EU court’s guidance, the District Court in the Netherlands that had referred the issue will now ban the sale of Van Haren’s shoes throughout the European Union.

The Louboutin trademark registration

A crucial takeaway from this case is the reward given for the smart way in which the trademark had been registered. In many trademark systems, the registrant is allowed to specify its two- or three-dimensional object with a brief description. Louboutin’s lawyers had wisely specified the filing as follows: “The mark consists of the color red (Pantone 18‑1663TP) applied to the sole of a shoe as shown (the contour of the shoe is not part of the trade mark but is intended to show the positioning of the mark).”

That victory may not last very long, however. EU trademark law was recently amended, with the effect that not only “shapes” but also “other characteristics” giving substantial value to the product may be barred from trademark registration. This change in the law opens a new can of worms: in particular, it remains to be seen whether pre-2018 trademarks, such as the one owned by Louboutin, can be invalidated on the basis of the new law.

Credit:  Diederik Stols | Guest Post

Phillips Nizer would like to thank Diederik Stols for the contribution of this post to the Fashion Industry Law Blog.  Diederik is a partner at the law firm BOEKX Advocaten in The Netherlands where he specializes in intellectual property, media and entertainment and e-business. (http://www.boekx.nl/en/)

Categories
Accessories Childrenswear Footwear Menswear Textiles Womenswear

Textiles and Tariffs

Just as fashion designers and retailers have been struggling to adapt to changing consumer demands, they now must face a new battle: a trade war.

Back in May, the White House announced its plan to impose tariffs on $50 billion of Chinese goods in the hope of pressuring China to stop alleged unfair trade practices and intellectual property infringement. After the U.S. Trade Representative, Robert E. Lighthizer, released the final list of goods subject to the new tariffs, China responded with tariffs of its own on U.S. goods. Upping the ante in July, the U.S. next threatened to impose a second round of levies, resulting in 25% aggregate tariffs on an additional $200 billion of Chinese goods. Once again, China hit back with more tariffs of its own.

Many economists have warned that the effect of a prolonged trade war between China and the U.S. will ultimately increase prices for American consumers and will damage U.S. businesses. Those working in the fashion industry are likely to agree. The May round of tariffs placed on Chinese imports, which covered a range of industrial, agricultural, and medical goods, left the fashion industry relatively unscathed. But the next round of tariffs, initially rumored to include textiles, handbags and suitcases, is likely to hit designers, retailers and, ultimately, the American shopper.

Following the U.S. threats made in July, Mr. Lighthizer agreed to hold a hearing to discuss market opposition to the proposed tariffs. In attendance at the hearing, held in August, were more than 350 stakeholders, including the Council of Fashion Designers of America, the American Apparel & Footwear Association and the Accessories Council.

To say that the American apparel industry relies on Chinese manufacturing may be an understatement. Kathryn Hopkins of Women’s Wear Daily (WWD) has noted that “China is vitally important to the industry with government data showing the U.S. imported $27 billion worth of apparel from the country last year, accounting for 34 percent of all apparel imports. That is more apparel than was imported from any other country, dwarfing second-place Vietnam at $12 billion.”

Concerned about impending tariffs, Edward Rosenfeld, the CEO of Steve Madden, told WWD: “We and others will certainly try to pass on a good chunk of this to the consumer in the form of higher retail prices.” Steve Madden is also looking to move its handbag manufacturing from China to Cambodia in response to the higher duties.

National Retail Federation President and CEO, Matthew Shay, told WWD: “This round of tariffs amount[s] to doubling down on the recklessness of imposing trade policy that will hurt U.S. families and workers more than they will hurt China – it’s two-and-a-half times the amount already imposed.”

Smaller businesses are particularly vulnerable to the proposed levies. Anne Harper, the CEO of OMG Accessories (annual sales: approximately $2 million), expressed her concern for the impending tariffs, stating: “I can’t just absorb that percentage…. The bread and butter of my business is selling to retailers, so that’s a big challenge. Q4 is where we ship all of our holiday goods. If the 10 percent comes into effect right before the goods ship from China, we’re subject to that extra 10 percent so it represents hundreds of thousands of dollars for my business. It’s basically a loss.”

On August 26, 2018, China filed a formal dispute with the World Trade Organization (WTO), alleging that the U.S. tariffs violate WTO rules.

On September 17, 2018, the White House made good on its warnings in July, confirming that tariffs of 10% would be placed on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports – ranging from silk to handbags. China promptly responded again, stating it would impose its own tariffs, of 5% to 10%, on $60 billion worth of U.S. goods. Meanwhile, the U.S. has threatened to increase tariffs on Chinese goods to 25% total on January 1, 2019, unless the two countries can conclude a trade deal.

Is there an endgame in sight? At this point, there are more questions than answers. The White House is slated to share more information following its September 17th announcement. One can only wait for the next episode of Textiles and Tariffs.

Credit:  Candace Arrington