Best Buy Cease & Desist Letter For Blog Coverage of Parody
Best Buy sent us the following Cease & Desist letter (page 1 & page 2) in reference to our blog post reporting on the Improv Everywhere Best Buy Blue Polo Shirts.
It’s so thoughtful of Best Buy to send us this nice gift during the holiday season.
Ongoing coverage:
“Best Buy Hates Satire and Free Speech” - Digg
“Best Buy threatens blogger over someone else’s parody” - Boing Boing
“Greatest Best Buy prank ever!…” - Matt Johnson
“Best Buy Handing Out C&D Letters for Christmas” - Improv Everywhere
“best buy sends cease and desist letter to blogger for writing about a t-shirt” - Tcritic
“Best Buy Cease And Desists Blogger For Reporting Someone Else’s Parody” - The Consumerist
“Best Buy Tries, Fails To Silence Bloggers” - Gadget Lab, Wired
“Best Buy Hands Out Cease & Desist Letters for Christmas” - Slashdot
UPDATE 1: Improv Everywhere has posted an update, along with the original C & D letter they received from Best Buy.
UPDATE 2: I just spoke with someone in Best Buy’s corporate PR department and they are going to check with their legal department regarding the situation. I was impressed by the conversation we had and their responsiveness to the issue.
UPDATE 3: One thing I wanted to mention is that before posting this C & D letter, I called the Best Buy attorney who sent it to confirm that they really meant to send it to a blogger who was just reporting on another blog post. They insisted that I was “promoting, not reporting” and that the demand letter was valid.
My question is would they send a C & D to a newspaper or magazine covering the same thing?
UPDATE 4: Here’s my write-up on the original Best Buy Mission organized by Improv Everywhere, which was the inspiration for the shirts.
UPDATE 5: Just to clarify, there are actually two issues here:
1) Best Buy going after Improv Everywhere and Neighborhoodies for creating and selling a t-shirt with a parody of the Best Buy logo.
2) Best Buy going after a blogger who wrote about Improv Everywhere and Neighborhoodies creating and selling a t-shirt with a parody of the Best Buy logo.
The C & D letter that Best Buy sent us was regarding issue #2.
UPDATE 6: Great new, Best Buy has just sent us an apology letter regarding the cease and desist letter the originally sent to us.
69 comments on “Best Buy Cease & Desist Letter For Blog Coverage of Parody”
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on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 12:49 pm
Thats complete bullshit Scott. How would anyone confuse or think that Laughing Squid is in anyway affiliated with Best Buy. They clearly don’t like improv-everywhere & are just using their lawyers to attempt to bully you into getting this taken down.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 12:58 pm
Solidarity!
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 12:59 pm
I’m no lawyer, but from my experience with issues like this, BB is playing the role of the bully even though they do not have any grounds behind their letter. It’s obvious that the shirts that you are “linking to” are different than the one used by BB. I suppose if you want to fuck with them further, you can remove the large logo and keep linking to the shirts. That is precisely what they requested, right?
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:01 pm
pwned
http://www.neighborhoodies.com/improv-everywhere-best-shirt-p-216.html
Product not found!
Looks like neighborhoodies has caved in already. I suppose this is all moot now.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:04 pm
but they dont mind that you plugged the Fuji F50 as only avail at best buy like 3 months ago.
what a bunch of douche bags.
im gonna take my vaccum, camera, and router (all with no questions asked replacement guarantees) and smash them in the middle of bryant street with a hammer and ask for replacements.
fight the power in this dark hour!!!
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:09 pm
The t-shirts are clearly parody, which is protected by Supreme Court rulings under their interpretation of the First Amendment. Also, I’m pretty sure that previous suits have shown that simply linking to a site does not actually mean endorsement or sales of products on that site.
I think you are pretty safe and can get a good chuckle out of this. However, as a word of caution, their lawyers probably outnumber your lawyers, though they probably don’t outnumber Craig Newmark’s lawyers, so you have that going for you.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:13 pm
Reason #3454 i’ll shop don’t at best buy. Please don’t take down the post, in fact other should blog this as well.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:23 pm
Would be interesting to see what an actual lawyer says, but as I mentioned on the other post, it would seem to me that your position is rather like a newspaper reporting on the topic. It would be like Starbucks sending a C&D to the Seattle PI for reporting on the Starbucks logo parody http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/332727_christiansbux22.html
You are only reporting, aren’t selling anything, plus there isn’t even a page up anymore to link to so personally I don’t see where Best Buy has a leg to stand on.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:26 pm
As much as I love to hate LS, I have to side with you on this. I call BS on BB.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:28 pm
Dugg and Blogged! (I love all these web 2.0 verbs).
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Letter reads “Best buy does not authorize, sponsor, endorse, or approve of your business”
You must be doing something right!
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:38 pm
Daaang! It seems as though every hexagon with extended lateral sides with a circular cut out at one end and in hexadecimal color #fff100 or C=2 M=0 Y=94 K=0 with bold arial font…..would be a copyright infringement?
Not exactly the best time of the year for Best Buy to be playing bully is it? Or maybe it is…as they’re gaining a bucket o’ free publicity out of this.
Oh, and Merry Christmas to you as well.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:51 pm
Plug1, you make an excellent point regarding the fact that my Fuji F50 write-up probably lead to the sale of several of those cameras at Best Buy.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Best Buy really are a bunch of clueless, strong arm n00bs. I no longer authorize, sponsor, endorse, or approve of their business and will not shop there.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 2:00 pm
Do you guys have any Nintendo Wiis in stock?
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 2:20 pm
Is this stupid? Yes. However, they may not be doing it to get it removed, but rather as evidence that they have attempted to protect their copyright. I’m no lawyer, but I know that if you have a trademark of something, and don’t go after stupid instances like this, then when you are before a judge with a REAL case, the judge or defendant can say “Yeah, but you didn’t go after this case, and this case, and this case with similar circumstances.” and they’d lose. Clearly, it’s parody and therefore protected.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Best Buy is nuts for C &D’ing you. You’re not representing Improv Everywhere in any way, merely reporting about it. Clearly they haven’t a legal leg to stand on. In any case, if there’s anything I can do other than not shopping at Best Buy, let me know.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 2:37 pm
Lame! I’m not sure much more really needs to be said.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 4:06 pm
Great idea, Plug1, but unfortunately Best Buy’s replacement plans aren’t by any means “no questions asked replacement guarantees.” Go in, grab a replacement plan brochure, and read up ;-)
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 4:11 pm
Thanks Best Buy. I didnt even know those Improv Everywhere shirts were for sale. A great hanukkah present! (someone put them back up for sale)
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 4:12 pm
How to lose customers 101.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 4:14 pm
They’re trying to bully you. Satire has been affirmed, time and again, by the Supreme Court and BB KNOWS this. They’re trying to get you to stay quiet without a legal battle. I will say this again: if the case goes to court YOU WILL WIN and you should sue the bastards for the unnecessary emotional stress they’ll be causing you.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 4:20 pm
Call me crazy but doesnt trademark law only apply if you are in the same business? For instance, they are selling this polo shirt which is a parody of best buy (fair use). However if they were selling a tv with the same logo then it would be an issue.
Im probably wrong in my explanation but either way i know best buy has no legs to stand on here as the whole issue is protected by the 1st amendment and there is legal precedent in using logo’s in parodies.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
I refuse to buy anything from any store that treats their customers like criminals and assumes they are all stealing and checks them on their way out. Especially since almost all theft is always proven to be by employees.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 5:04 pm
Mmmm…perhaps The Price is Right should sue Best Buy considering they had those yellow tags for name tags far before BB did. Give me a break!
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 5:23 pm
The funniest thing is that the Improv Everywhere mission was a great piece of unauthorized viral marketing for Best Buy. I thought it made them seem sorta cool even though they weren’t in on it.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 5:28 pm
Scott;
tell them to read Brand Hijack. A book which sites more aggressive misuse of a brand and talks about how the brands should have dealt better with it. It is no longer good marketing to have a bad sense of humor about these things.
Scot
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 5:39 pm
Dear Scott. Would you please consider putting that C&D letter on Ebay? I would like the opportunity to buy it as a souvenir. If the funds went to a favorite charity, I might bid pretty high…
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 6:50 pm
I wonder if things would have been different if Improv Everywhere wouldn’t have put that “R” for registered trademark on their shirt. That “R”may have caused them to go after people trying to dilute their registered mark, even just for the motions to show an attempt to protect it.
As far as going after a Blog like LS, that’s just dumbness.
Years ago Shannon Wheeler of Too Much Coffee Man fame had the best Starbucks mermaid shirt which said “Consume” which had mega legal battling, with the corporation winning by sheer numbers, length of the case..
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 7:05 pm
Go to Best Buy, bring up Laughing Squid on all their display PC’s and sue them for using your logo to sell their product.
(Or something equally banal and nonsensical that seems to lack any reason or actual basis in law)
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 7:38 pm
This actually inspired me to write a letter to Best Buy. This is an example of everything that is wrong with corporations. And this is proof that BB has an inept marketing department. I’ve seen the Improv Everywhere skits and the parody shirts, and I see tons of positive marketing potential for BB in this - let alone the opportunity to prove that they have a sense of humor and aren’t just a bunch of corporatrons obeying the commands of the NYSE Mothership. Knee Jerk C&D letters are simply bad form. Bad form, I say!
Blog On!
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 8:23 pm
“I’m no lawyer, but from my experience with issues like this, BB is playing the role of the bully even though they do not have any grounds behind their letter. It’s obvious that the shirts that you are “linking to†are different than the one used by BB. I suppose if you want to fuck with them further, you can remove the large logo and keep linking to the shirts. That is precisely what they requested, right?”
^^this
I am a lawyer, and I can vouch for the poor sap that had to write this. He doesn’t care a lick about this blog or the shirts, but has no choice but to protect his client’s TM. If they actually took you to court, it would be because you flagrantly chose to flout the warnings you’ve been given. This is a CYA letter designed to protect them against future infringement by an actual competitor.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 8:31 pm
sounds like you should contact chilling effects http://www.chillingeffects.org/ it is an eff related project that helps keep companies honest.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 9:54 pm
This is a personal bit of grammatic pet-peeving (and probably nit picky), but I hate it - repeat, hate it - when official letters use the word “over” instead of “more.”
E.G.: “For over twenty years, Best Buy has done everything in its power to cordially screw … er … provide service to its customers.”
Best Buy, if you’re going to shit all over free speech, at least do so with some sort of profession gleam. The word “over” relates to physical position - “more” signifies a greater amount.
on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 10:44 pm
Neighborhoodies has about a dozen shirts left. We were forced to take it down along with improv everywhere, it’s true.
are we in the right? of course! but guess who doesn’t have money to send legal letters back to Best Buy? that’s us. that said, we’re happy to mail out our remaining dozen of these super awesome shirts - just email me at michael@neighborhoodies.com or call us up.
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 3:09 am
Dugg and Blogged! (I love all these web 2.0 verbs).
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 3:20 am
It is parody.
And it doesn’t cost anything to send Best Buy a letter. Emails are free. You hit REPLY and type “We are protected by the Supreme Court for the purpose of PARODY.”
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 4:18 am
Have you looked at Public Citizen? They have lawyers that defend this kind of thing for free all the time.
Anyway, I blogged all about your issue including linking to the original site and your two articles covering them. Since your in trouble for blogging and I blogged about you and said that I support you, does that mean I’m promoting the promotion of stuff that’ll piss off Best Buy? We shall see…
Article here:
http://www.jeremyduffy.com/best-buy-tries-to-snuff-coverage-of-news-by-bloggers/
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 7:01 am
What bill said - There’s no teeth in the request, and it’s probably just to show ongoing protection of their mark, even if the shirts were not parody, your use of the “improv anywhere” bb logo, is not an infringing use. That said, I actually don’t think the shirts themselves are really parody, they’re really just replacing the words best buy with the name “improv everywhere” and selling the shirts for profit.
I think the original event was probably parody, although bb could probably make an intentional interference with business relations argument, if they’d wanted to.
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 7:25 am
Wow, check the Constitution, Bastard Buy — parody is protected free speech. (At least it is while the Constitution is still in effect… ~grumble~)
It’s not even like they were taunting BB with their tag logo… just using something similar for their own purpose. They may as well send C&D to the teevee show Chuck for having a store vaguely similar to BB…
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 7:29 am
Don’t confuse copyright and trademark law. They are two entirely different animals. Satire and parody are exceptions to copyright, but not to trademark. If you market parody products using someone else’s trademark, or a reasonable facsimile of such a trademark, you are liable for damages.
This is *exactly* what trademark law is designed to stop–someone creating a product using someone’s else’s logo or trademark. In this case, there was no consumer fraud intended, but its still a violation of trademark protection. Trademark law is all about protecting the identity of your company and products so that consumers know what they’re buying.
BB may seem like jerks and that they lack a sense of humor, but the law leaves them little choice. Unlike copyright, which is yours no matter what, trademarks have to be defended or you lose them. They probably should have just let this one pass, but some cog in the legal department fired off a form letter.
It’s unlikely that BB would take action against either Neighborhoodies or Improv Everywhere. They’re probably just building documentation that they are actively defending their trademark so that when a real competitor infringes on it, they can win in court.
(I am not affiliated with Best Buy in anyway. I just understand where they’re coming from.)
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 8:07 am
I respect all the comments above. The comments that BB must do this to protect their IP rights are correct. It is not clear that this is in fact a parody. The legal definition of parody in TM law is very very narrow. It focuses on whether you are parodying one specific mark or whether the parody is of a larger issue. You only get the parody defense if you can show that you had no choice but to use this mark and it must be a commentary on this mark. Unfortunately if you are parodying society at large then you can not use another’s TM. The issue here is certainly one that can be debated.
That being said I hate best buy. They are really terrible to their customers. I have not shopped there for years because they think that their customers can be walked all over. Further, even if they do have a claim here this just shows how companies really have no clue how to treat the public nowadays. It is too easy to get your story out for companies to treat a customer like this.
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 9:01 am
It’s the season to be jolly!
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 11:31 am
Gotta say, I’m disappointed. I truly expected this to be the BEST Buy, Cease, and Desist letter EVER.
It’s not even remotely funny.
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 11:40 am
Query: Why did you black out the names of the lawyers sending the letter? “You know who we are, so we ask the same of you.” What’s your motive for throwing up a shield of anonymity for the legal soldiers doing Best Buy’s dirty work?
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 1:17 pm
The IE site is down, at least for me. I don’t have a Facebook account so I can check IE’s profile to see whats going on.
Anyone know anything?
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 3:08 pm
The BestBuy lawyers just need to loosen up. Some people simply don’t have a sense of humor. Their apology letter proves it.
on Wednesday, December 12th, 2007 at 7:04 pm
Dane commented that “The word ‘over’ relates to physical position - ‘more’ signifies a greater amount.”
Not really…
Michael Swan’s Practical English Usage has the following to say about the usage of “over”:
“We usually use ‘over’, not ‘above’, to talk about ages and speeds, and to mean ‘more than’.”
His three listed examples include:
“You have to be over 18 to see this film.
The police said she was driving at over 110 mph.
There were over 100,000 people at the festival.”
Merriam-Webster’s definition of “over” (as a preposition) lists seven different correct usages, including:
3 a: more than
I could list more examples, but I think my point has been made. “Over” has plenty of legitimate definitions not related to physical position–and one of them can take the place of “more than.”
on Saturday, December 15th, 2007 at 4:28 pm
LOL! Best Buy wins hands down for best free online advertising campaign, ever. Oh yah it prolly cost them a few cents to give their already paid lawyers for sending out these silly letters.
All done to get bloggers yakking/posting/linking about it. all so ‘Best Buy’ would be in your heads these holiday shopping season. Well done, Best Buy!
hey Scott did they slip you a little kick-back in with the ‘apology’ letter? :)