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Compare and Contrast: Maill Carriers and Garbage Trucks
Posted by James Grimmelmann on Thursday, November 04 @ 19:04:57 EST Trademark
The U.S. Postal Service has grown a clue muscle when it comes to trademark issues. After initially threatening indie-rock group The Postal Service with a lawsuit for trademark infringement, the USPS changed its mind and is now entering into a licensing agreement with the band, who will play for a convention of USPS executives and may supply music for USPS ads.

There's also talk of selling The Postal Service's album at post offices, which makes a kind of goofy sense. I haven't been a fan of USPS cross-promotion -- the Cat in the Hat posters all over my local post office really got on my nerves and I wish I could hear the name "Lance Armstrong" without thinking that he drives a mail truck -- but I could get more into waiting on the inevitable lines if there were more Sub Pop involved.

On the dumb side of recent trademark news, however, is Sunset Scavenger, a San Francisco garbage company which sued DJ Zeph, a Bay Area DJ and "disciple of music." Zeph's offense? Calling his album "Sunset Scavenger" and decorating it with a picture of Sunset Scavenger trucks. Zeph and his label couldn't afford a court fight and had to settle, changing the album name and replacing the artwork.

Americans who buy stamps, a tiny bit of your money is going to hire some musicians to play a show. San Franciscans living in the Sunset, a tiny bit of your money is going to sue a musician and force him to pay to reprint an album. Which of these two seems like a better deal?

 
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