Photo credit to TMZ
What do thongs and property rights have in common? They both protect the property without compromising the view.
German lace company, Klauber Bros. Inc. has filed a copyright infringement suit against the Jenner sisters, claiming they used Klauber’s flowers and swirling curls lace design without permission.
Klauber Bros. is a German company specializing in rigid and stretch laces since 1859. The company accuses the Jenners of “creating, selling, manufacturing, causing to be manufactured, imported and/or distributed fabric and/or garments bearing lace featuring designs which are identical to or substantially similar to [its own lace designs].” The company seeks all profits received by the sisters, backed by claims the Jenners used the company’s designs on both a Kylie Jenner-branded thong and on a waistband of a black “Kendall + Kylie” slip dress sold at Nordstrom. The company’s official website states, “Most of our patterns are copyrighted and based on original artwork.”
This isn’t Kendall and Kylie’s first accusation of intellectual property infringement. You may recall their same fashion label was sued for using photos of Tupac Shakur without permission of the photographer. The suit was only dropped when the sisters agreed to pull the shirts from their clothing label. In a separate suit, the sisters found themselves in hot water for selling shirts under their label at PacSun with the phrase, “Run away. Fall in love. Never return.” This shirt concerned Island Company, who marketed a similar shirt with “Quit your job. Buy a ticket. Get a tan. Fall in love. Never return.” The result of this suit was the same as the Tupac debacle.
Copyright laws are designed to protect an author or creator’s original and the creative expressions of in a tangible medium, which is paper, electronic, recording or nearly anything you can see, hear, or read. Infringement arises when the copyrighted work is reproduced, performed, distributed, displayed, or made into a derivative work without the copyright owner’s permission.
As of the date of this post, the offending thong has not been removed from Kylie’s webstore.
Article by Carissa Chow