Oh No! What If More Than One Shoemaker Makes Shoes With Red Soles?
from the the-horror.-the-horror. dept
While we still don’t have the damaging and totally unnecessary fashion copyright, fashion designers still try to use other methods to lock up their designs. Apparently, shoe designer Christian Louboutin* felt that trademarking high heel shoes with red soles could block competitors. However, in a court test of this theory, a judge has pointed out that Louboutin probably never should have received the trademark in the first place, and refused to block others from having red soles:
?Because in the fashion industry color serves ornamental and aesthetic functions vital to robust competition,? Judge Marrero ruled, ?the court finds that Louboutin is unlikely to be able to prove that its red outsole brand is entitled to trademark protection, even if it has gained enough protection in the market to have secondary meaning.?
But now, how will any fashion designer be inspired to try other color soles?
* Just as a quick note, for reasons that go way beyond my understanding, it seems that one of (if not) the largest comment spammers we get are people trying to sell (probably counterfeit) Christian Louboutin shoes. Talk about bad targeting by spammers. This is not exactly a Louboutin audience. However, we get hundreds of such comments a day. Our spam filters use a few heuristics to determine what is spam and what is not and while it’s not definite, there’s at least a high likelihood that if you mention “Louboutin” in your comment that it will be held by the spam filter. We’ll endeavor to free this as quickly as possible. Or just don’t mention it in your comment at all, and hopefully it’ll get through…
Filed Under: christian louboutin, red shoes, trademark
Companies: christian louboutin
Comments on “Oh No! What If More Than One Shoemaker Makes Shoes With Red Soles?”
I propose “red sole trademark troll” as the substitute designation to make sure our comments on the individual in question don’t get filtered out as spam.
You need to write about this case some more, track what happens etc.
How else can you remake the ‘red shoe diaries’?
Someone needs to make a ‘Red Shoe Diaries” episode about these literal red shoes.
Re: The First Movie.
H’mmm…. did any of you kids ever hear of the movie, The Red Shoes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Red_Shoes_(1948_film)
I smell movie remake
The Man With One Red (Sole) Shoe!, starring Christian Louboutin
maybe they're not spammers
maybe the real company is just so desperate to sell the crappy shoes that they have to resort to extreme tactics like trademarking a colour or flooding comment threads…
*gasp*
I sold red soled shoes first, how dare you also sell red shoes! Blasphemy!
“Oh No! What If More Than One Shoemaker Makes Shoes With Red Soles?”
INFRINGEMENT!!!!
Re: Re:
I have a pair of little sneakers that I bought about 10 years ago. They’re yellow with black stripes and red rubber soles. I have nothing to wear them with usually.
Re: Re:
I bet they would settle for nothing less than what happens in The Red Shoes (2005) for stealing, “Off with their feet”!
Ugh
This is not exactly a Louboutin audience.
Bastard. Now I’ve got geeks in drag pictures stuck in my head.
Re: Ugh
Thanks. Now you put in my head too. eeeewww!
not exactly new
I’ve seen high heeled shoes with red soles in the last century already. In fact I can remember a little shoestore in Vienna that had quite a collection
Good to see at least one judge in the US of A has some common sense when it comes to these things
So they copyright a colour red mm lets sue everyone in a red brick house or who wears a red dress etc could keep lawyers going for decades.
Fashion designers don't know what they are asking for
Doesn’t this guy realize that his shoes stand on the design innovations of many others? Imagine if somebody had trademarked the high heels, or the 5″ heels, or the platform heels, or stilleto heels, etc, etc, etc. Add to that the fact that trademarks last pretty much forever! It’s not like a design patent or something like that.
This guy had to copy others in order to add his own special (red) touch. And others will need to copy him in order to add their own special touches. Start adding intellectual property in fashion design elements and the whole industry will grind to a halt! Fashion designers should be happy that their field is relatively LFZ (Lawyer Free Zone). Just take a look at the tech industry!!!! Fashion designers should NOT be inviting the big sharks to play in their pool…
Re: Fashion designers don't know what they are asking for
No they only see the possible upside for themselves. They would never infringe themselves so this just stops others from ripping them off.
Like Diane Von Furstenberg, who lobbies and lobbies to get fashion copyrights. She has been sued multiple times for “stealing” other artists designs.
The market for these goods is shrinking some, people who would save up for a very long time to get 1 pair of these shoes… well they are broke now. And *GASP* you can buy a pair of much cheaper shoes with red soles and people will think you bought the real thing.
This ruins the image of their products being “exclusive”.
They are worried their customers will start to figure out that paying hundreds and hundreds of dollars for shoes is stupid, and buy the knock offs. Or they will buy the knock offs thinking the $40 shoes in that store are the real thing.
If 100 women in an office building all have red sole shoes, how will we know which one is important?
Besides getting laws and such to protect the way you have always done something and stop you from adapting and innovating are working so well in the other industries.
Re: Re: Fashion designers don't know what they are asking for
Sad but very true.
A surprisingly large number of people are quite adept at telling the difference between the real thing and the knockoff. Those who can’t tell the difference wouldn’t notice anyway.
Re: Re: Re: Fashion designers don't know what they are asking for
Well when the shoes in question are on someone wearing the latest in cheap “designer” wear from a mid-end department store, it is that much easier.
The problem is the designers think their customers can not tell the different so they need these protections. This gives them a single point to tell the world I am wearing this designers shoes.
Re: Re: Re: Fashion designers don't know what they are asking for
If 100 women in an office building all have red sole shoes, how will we know which one is important?
By their name…. !!! (of the person, not the shoe)
Re: Re: Re:2 Fashion designers don't know what they are asking for
A secretary is a secret-ary. Some secret-aries are of course more important than others, based on the importance of the secrets they keep. Can you imagine Hillary Clinton wearing those kind of shoes? She’s only the Secretary of State. Really powerful women usually dress like schoolteachers.
Hillary Campaigning:
http://photos.jinwicked.com/politics/2008-02-28-hillary-clinton/20080228_hillaryclinton17/
Hillary gets down to talk face-to-face with a couple of very small constituents. Who ever heard of a real politician doing otherwise?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132×6009305
Having an earnest conversation with the boss. The Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense usually have conflicting ideas about how to deal with other countries, and I imagine she’s probably trying to get a word in for her side:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Barack_Obama_and_Hillary_Clinton_walking_together.jpg
And here we have the contrast between fashion designer’s fantasy and reality:
http://www.dollymix.tv/2008/04/donatella_versace_thinks_hilla.html
The kind of girls who emulate actresses, and who buy the kinds of platform shoes a certain fashion designer wants to monopolize, and who don’t know any better than wear them to work are not secret-aries. They are most likely call-center workers, the new office proletariat. Their job is to call up people who don’t want to be called, and try to sell them stuff they don’t want.
if it is 9 shoemakers !!!!
what happens ??
You get a Shoemaker levi (9)
Counterfeit or imitation?
Mike, are these ‘counterfeit’ shoes you’re referring to sold as the genuine article, or sold wholesale to vendors as counterfeit items (to pass off), OR are these simply cheap imitations intended for sale to people fully aware that they are imitations, who have no intention of selling them as genuine?
There’s nothing wrong with cheap imitation shoes eh?
Re: Counterfeit or imitation?
*blink*
I think your mixing the message.
The story is about if other designers can have red soled shoes. They can much to the surprise of the designer who is famous for them. Other people made red soles before him, and they wanted to make more.
The shoes (possibly counterfeit) mentioned in an addition to the article, as a reason to avoid using the designers name. Spammers tend to offer this brand of shoe quite often. Using the name would most likely cause legitimate posts to vanish into the void.
And sadly most people would know that they had to be fakes because the real shoes sell for $1000+ and random message on a website says I can get them for $50!
These are also the people still waiting for their millions from a Nigerian prince.
OMG!
it is a really slow day
didn’t Apple do something we can all hate?
Re: OMG! Barrell Scraping !!
thats, most days here are “slow days”, when you get to the bottom of the barrel there is not alot you can do, except see what you can scrape from it.
its usually that way, we normally get things like “how can a car maker produce a car if some other car maker is using wheels that are ROUND !!!!”
Or is someone patents a motor car gearbox, that means according to mike that NO OTHER CAR maker can EVER produce a car with a gearbox !!!
oh dear… how sad.
Also it appears that Mike feels that for everything or anything there is ONLY ONE METHOD to acheive that!
Clearly, after all these years it is still a bit beyond Mike to understand that a patent is a METHOD of doing something, and NOT what it does.
And if someone patents that METHOD that no one else can EVER achieve the same results by applying ANOTHER METHOD to the problem!!.
The steam engine is a METHOD of generating rotational force (torque), you patent the STEAM ENGINE, not the generating of torque.
the steam engine is simply a METHOD of achieving a result, if you patent a steam engine, that does not stop you from patenting OTHER methods of generating torque, such as a water wheel, or an electric motor !!
So there appears to be two possibilities here, either 1) Mike is stupid and does not have a clue !!
or
2) Mike is simply lying to press home his own bias, and to try to convince other people what somehow Mikes reality somehow reflects ANYTHING to do with the REAL WORLD !!!
I guess there is a thrid option that being, Mike is simply willing to say anything, regardless of accuracy or proof to ensure he gets a decent Google Kickback…. after all that is far easier than getting a REAL job.
I have employed a great many people in my life, and you can quickly tell if someone who says they have skills and abilities on their resume, that they do not really have, (they are lying), making it easy to find the right person to employ.
There is NO WAY ON EARTH, I would EVER consider employing Mike for ANYTHING, it is clear he could not be trusted in a business environment, or ANY environment.
Nor could I rely on him to be unbiased and consistant, I guess that is why Mike likes to “talk the talk” but make it VERY clear he is incapable of walking the walk.
Thats right, “if the only tool you have in your toolbox is a hammer, after awile everything starts to look like a nail”.
Get some more ‘tools’ Mike.
Shoes ?
You country is going to shit, you have massive debt, massive unemployment, massive housing problems, sub-prime loan failures, excessive greed….
next to NO manufacturing industry, you are outsourcing technological advancements to overseas, borrowing money from overseas. Closing things like NASA.
And Mike is worried about fucking red shoes !!!
Let me just click my heels 3 times and say
“There’s no place like home.”
“There’s no place like home.”
“There’s no place like home.”
Re: Oh no, prior art.
Star Trek had better watch out, with their teleporter, ‘Beam me up scotty’ and “There’s no place like home” sounds like the same technology to me.
Really funny to see darryl getting that desperate 😉
Re: Re:
Don’t worry. He’ll find a nice high ledge to step off of soon.
the independent
haha, thanks Andrew D. Todd, that is just hilarious =D
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Don’t worry. He’ll find a nice high ledge to step off of soon.