PornHub owner MindGeek is threatening a kebab shop in NYC with trademark infringement::If you’ve been listening to the Vergecast you know the standard for trademark infringement is “likelihood of confusion,” and while it’s true the Hub is known for ⚫️🟠, something tells me the folks walking into Doner Haus aren’t confused about what’s on the menu. Full story in Chelsea News, a hyperlocal NYC news site, via Verge pal Alexandra Roberts.
It’s not quiet so cut and dry. The law is written to cover 90% but this isn’t a criminal matter, it’s a civil one, and civil suits are always decided in courtrooms. If I created a weed dispensary and called it Instant Pot and stylized my logo like that of a popular countertop pressure cooker they’d be well within their rights to sue despite being wildly different industries.
Where does parody fit in? There are a lot of examples of restaurants like this and all seem to be based on a play on words/tongue in cheek parody of pornhub due to the names of their businesses, however they are not using the name pornhub at all just the style of text inside the orange and black pill
I’m not a trademark lawyer but I’m not sure parody would fly there.