Here's the TMZ report, with a photo of both shirts.
How lame to use that exact image, which wasn't perfectly drawn. I guess the idea is to get right on the line where viewers perceive a heart — and wonder why it's upside down — and then pop into the realization that it's breasts. Maybe it was clear that the effect worked on the Venice Beach shirt, and you don't want to tinker with what has proved reliable.
Of course, it's generally pretty awful to want to wear an image of breasts on your chest, but I guess it's better for Nicki Minaj fans to celebrate her body knowing that she herself is selling the shirt than it is to buy a shirt that celebrates the bodies of women on the beach who are not saying I want you to isolate and make a fuss about my breasts and who do not make any money off the shirts.
Who is supposed to want to wear these shirts — men or women? A woman wearing either of these shirts is wearing breasts over her breasts and likely to be understood to be saying hey, look at my breasts... I've got real breasts under here... think about that. A man wearing either shirt — especially the Venice Beach shirt — seems to be saying... well, it depends on how the man looks, doesn't it? I'm cycling through different mental pictures of men and getting a lot of different messages. I'll just say you'd better be awfully cute and happy looking if you wear that.
Speaking of originality, the "I [heart] X" design goes back to a trademark owned by the New York State Department of Economic Development.
The logo was designed by graphic designer Milton Glaser in 1976 in the back of a taxi and was drawn with red crayon on scrap paper. The original drawing is held in the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan.I encourage you legal folk to discuss the difference between copyright and trademark in this Venice Beach/Nicki Minaj problem. I assume there's no trademark claim and that the copyright problem — if there is one — could have been avoided by drawing the shape slightly differently.
But I will go on to wonder who first got idea that a heart, flipped, looked like breasts? Ah! But here's a superseding question: Why do we have that simple ❤ shape in the first place? It doesn't look that much like the internal organ. Consider the possibility that the resemblance to breasts is the origin story for the heart shape. Here's "Ever Wondered Why The Hearts We Draw Look Nothing Like The Shape Of Real Hearts? Here’s Why":
5. It looks a pair of woman's breastsSo the heart shape looks like breasts even before you invert it and may even be the reason we have the shape in the first place. But you notice the number "5" in the explanation above. It's one of 7 ideas about why the shape has that form, including that it was a way to draw a woman's pubic mound and — all of these are inverted ❤s — the vulva, buttocks, and testicles.
The ideographic heart when inverted, is roughly triangular in shape with two round lobes occupying the base of the triangle - it is a fair supposition of a woman’s breasts pushed together probably by a corset which exaggerates the pair of breasts and narrows the waist.
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Would it be genderal appropriation for a man to wear one of those shirts?
Maybe it’s meant to allude to her giant ass.
My husband once asked, "What do you want from New York?" "I want a classic 'I ❤️ NY' t-shirt." He delivered!
Another time I said, "nothing," and he brought home cake, so that was pretty good too.
If Nicki's shirt had said, "I love Nicki's Breasts," she'd be okay.
And that'd be okay with me too.
not the first one to say that, but inverted-heart-buttocks would be more appropriate for Nicki
Breasts are fun.
Breasts are like Trump (a possible tag).
Some commenters here are not like Breasts or Trump.
The answer to the legal question is: it's complicated.
I used to speed-walk in Central Park for years, and I always saw the shapely derrieres of the women jogging in the park as looking like "upside-down valentines," as I described them to a work colleague.
So pulp the knock-off “I [upside down heart] Althouse” shorts?
While the idea is certainly ripped off, including the style of the drawing, they changed more than the color. The original has a lower cut on the bikini top.
Maybe I look at such things too closely
"Speaking of originality, the "I [heart] X" design goes back to a trademark owned by the New York State Department of Economic Development.
The logo was designed by graphic designer Milton Glaser in 1976 in the back of a taxi and was drawn with red crayon on scrap paper. The original drawing is held in the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan. I encourage you legal folk to discuss the difference between copyright and trademark in this Venice Beach/Nicki Minaj problem. I assume there's no trademark claim and that the copyright problem — if there is one — could have been avoided by drawing the shape slightly differently."
One of the keys to catch in a LS exam is that the original I Heart NY logo is that it was created and apparently published in 1976, which would have put it under the 1909 Act, where publication and notice were required, and not the 1976 Act (effective 1/1/78) where notice was not required. If the original did not have a proper notice affixed to it, it likely fell into the public domain. Not sure about the subject matter requirements under the 1909 Acts, but under the 1976 Act which is what the current designs fall under, subject matter should be fine - the design is, itself, nonfunctional. Both designs are then derivative works of the I Heart NY logo. If it had the proper notice on it, so wasn't in the PD, then permission would be required. Otherwise, if in the PD then no permission from NY is required. Flipping the heart, and showing the bra/bikini should be sufficient originality for copyright under the 1976/Berne rules. But the lettering on the second is probably closer to the original NY logo, so no infringement there. Which comes back to the inverted heart w/bra/bikini outline as the protected elements.
The key to TM analysis is likelihood of confusion. The derivation analysis is somewhat similar to C/R - NY would have had the original TM. Likely, I think fell into the PD through lack of enforcement - you just see it too much anymore for everyone to automatically think NY. The problem though is that the Simon version was probably not well enough known when Minaj knocked it off. So, the question is whether and when TM was filed (and whether it was issued). If too late, and he hadn't built sufficient secondary meaning by the time it was knocked off, he may lose his TM rights, at least to her.
Oh, and I hate his terminology. He didn't "copyright" the work. You haven't copyrighted works of original expression, since the 1976 Act went into effect, since copyright is now by operation of law. You can mark it, and register it, but can no longer copyright it.
"While the idea is certainly ripped off, including the style of the drawing, they changed more than the color. The original has a lower cut on the bikini top.
Maybe I look at such things too closely"
In both C/R and TM (as well as horseshoes, hand grenades, etc), close usually counts. C/R requires copying for infringement, but the closer the two works are together, the more similar, the harder it is to show lack of copying. There are different standards of proof required, depending on whether access to the original work can be shown. Substantial simularity is required if access can be shown. Striking nag simularity otherwise. I think that we are in striking simularity territory here. This can be overcome, with proof of independent creation, but that is hard, with this level of simularity.
For TM, copying is irrelevant. Likelihood of confusion is of key importance. Absent registration, the key is seeing Nikki's logo and assuing that it was licensed by Venice Beach (since it is unlikely that she, herself, would be confused for the beach). So, from that point of view, assuming a sufficiently large population that would see both logos, the closer the two are together, the greater the likelihood of confusion.
There is no such thing as heart-shaped breasts, but there are, praise the Lord, heart-shaped asses.
Who writes this shit? Are we back to "creepy ass-cracker?"
Suppose the heart/breasts were moved to the center of the shirt. No infringement? Less disturbing assymetry for sure.
Left unsaid, is: "how the hell can you copyright a logo?"
This is evidence of a copyright office out of control, and a playground for people who want to become a member of Congress just to get rich.
Problems they don’t have in Venezuela.
“Left unsaid, is: "how the hell can you copyright a logo?"
Actually, nothing really new there. The standard is sufficient original expression, which turns out to be a very low bar (alphabetizing entries in a phone book was insufficient). Before the enactment of the 1976 Act, formalitiesvwere required. But esp after we joined the Berne Convention copyright treaty (effective here 1989), copyright has been automatic, and has had minimal original expression requirements.
Not sure why you think that a logo shouldn’t be protected by copyright. Many have sufficient original expression. Indeed, millions of dollars are spent every year designing them.
Breasts, vulva, buttocks, testicles? All of the above. “In The Amorous Heart, Dr. Marilyn Yalom tracks the heart metaphor and heart iconography across two thousand years, through Christian theology, pagan love poetry, medieval painting, Shakespearean drama, Enlightenment science, and into the present.”
“A Heart Says 'Love' -- But Why?” (Public Radio Interview)
"women on the beach who are not saying I want you to isolate and make a fuss about my breasts"
There are clothing choices that reduce such unwanted reactions.
Testicles was a Greek orator famous for seduction.
Did these guys ever get sued?
Testicles was a Greek orator famous for seduction.
I heard he invented the teabag.
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