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Membership + Other Ways to Give + Membership FAQ * Donate + Donate to EFF + Shop + Other Ways to Give * Search form Search [ ] Sorry, Gas Companies - Parody Isn't Infringement (Even If It Creeps You Out) DEEPLINKS BLOG By Cara Gagliano October 30, 2024 Graphic of three shelves of colorful soup cans labeled with TM Sorry, Gas Companies - Parody Isn't Infringement (Even If It Creeps You Out) Share It Share on Twitter Share on Facebook Copy link Graphic of three shelves of colorful soup cans labeled with TM Activism comes in many forms. You might hold a rally, write to Congress, or fly a blimp over the NSA. Or you might use a darkly hilarious parody to make your point, like our client Modest Proposals recently did. Modest Proposals is an activist collective that uses parody and culture jamming to advance environmental justice and other social causes. As part of a campaign shining a spotlight on the environmental damage and human toll caused by the liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry, Modest Proposals invented a company called Repaer. The fake company's website offers energy companies the opportunity to purchase "life offsets" that balance the human deaths their activities cause by extending the lives of individuals deemed economically valuable. The website also advertises a "Plasma Pals" program that encourages parents to donate their child's plasma to wealthy recipients. Scroll down on the homepage a bit, and you'll see the logos for three (real) LNG companies--Repaer's "Featured Partners." Believe it or not, the companies didn't like this. (Shocking!) Two of them--TotalEnergies and Equinor--sent our client stern emails threatening legal action if their names and logos weren't removed from the website. TotalEnergies also sent a demand to the website's hosting service, Netlify, that got repaer.earth taken offline. That was our cue to get involved. We sent letters to both companies, explaining what should be obvious: the website was a noncommercial work of activism, unlikely to confuse any reasonable viewer. Trademark law is about protecting consumers; it's not a tool for businesses to shut down criticism. We also sent a counternotice to Netlify denying TotalEnergies' allegations and demanding that repaer.earth be restored. We wish this were the first time we've had to send letters like that, but EFF regularly helps activists and critics push back on bogus trademark and copyright claims. This incident is also part of a broader and long-standing pattern of the energy industry weaponizing the law to quash dissent by environmental activists. These are just examples EFF has written about. We've been fighting these tactics for a long time, both by representing individual activist groups and through supporting legislative efforts like a federal anti-SLAPP bill . Frustratingly, Netlify made us go through the full DMCA counternotice process--including a 10-business-day waiting period to have the site restored--even though this was never a DMCA claim. (The DMCA is copyright law, not trademark, and TotalEnergies didn't even meet the notice requirements that Netlify claims to follow.) Rather than wait around for Netlify to act, Modest Proposals eventually moved the website to a different hosting service. Equinor and TotalEnergies, on the other hand, have remained silent. This is a pretty common result when we help push back against bad trademark and copyright claims: the rights owners slink away once they realize their bullying tactics won't work, without actually admitting they were wrong. We're glad these companies seem to have backed off regardless, but victims of bogus claims deserve more certainty than this. Related Issues Creativity & Innovation Trademark Share It Share on Twitter Share on Facebook Copy link Join EFF Lists Discover more. Email updates on news, actions, events in your area, and more. Email Address [ ] Postal Code (optional) [ ] Anti-spam question: Enter the three-letter abbreviation for Electronic Frontier Foundation: [ ] Don't fill out this field (required) [ ] [Submit] Thanks, you're awesome! Please check your email for a confirmation link. Oops something is broken right now, please try again later. Related Updates scales of justice icon + starburst Deeplinks Blog by Corynne McSherry | October 16, 2024 Courts Agree That No One Should Have a Monopoly Over the Law. Congress Shouldn't Change That Some people just don't know how to take a hint. For more than a decade, giant standards-development organizations (SDOs) have been fighting in courts around the country, trying use copyright law to control access to other laws. 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Did you know Disney's Steamboat Willie entered the public domain this year? Since its 1928 debut, U.S. Congress has made multiple changes to copyright law, extending Disney's ownership of this cultural icon for almost a century. A century.Creativity should spark more creativity.That's not how intellectual property laws are... Marshmallows roasting over the flames of a laptop in a forest with text: EFF Presents The Encryptids Deeplinks Blog by M. Jackalope | June 13, 2024 Hand me the flashlight. I'll be right back... It's time for the second installment of campfire tales from The Encryptids. Do you ever feel like tech companies still own the devices you've paid for? Monsieur Jackalope tells us why interoperability plays a key role in giving you freedom in tech. How to Fix the Internet - Nettice Gaskins - AI on the Artist's Palette Deeplinks Blog by Josh Richman | June 4, 2024 Podcast Episode: AI on the Artist's Palette Collaging, remixing, sampling--art always has been more than the sum of its parts, a synthesis of elements and ideas that produces something new and thought-provoking. Technology has enabled and advanced this enormously, letting us access and manipulate information and images in ways that would've been unimaginable just a few decades... Discover more. Email updates on news, actions, events in your area, and more. Email Address [ ] Postal Code (optional) [ ] Anti-spam question: Enter the three-letter abbreviation for Electronic Frontier Foundation: [ ] Don't fill out this field (required) [ ] [Submit] Thanks, you're awesome! Please check your email for a confirmation link. Oops something is broken right now, please try again later. 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