The madness between the Beastie Boys and toymaker Goldieblox has taken another turn, flip and parry with the legendary rap group gaining the upper hand.
After the toy company–whose products are geared towards younger females–sued the Beastie Boys to fight for their right to feature one of their songs in an advertisement, the Beasties snapped back saying it was unauthorized. Realizing their mistake, Goldieblox released a statement professing their fandom and agreeing to remove their remix to 1986’s “Girls” from their commercial.
Bygones were seemingly bygones until the surviving members, Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz and Michael “Mike D” Diamond countersued with a lawsuit for copyright infringement. It was an explicit detail in the late Adam “MCA” Yauch’s will that the group’s music not be used for any personal gain.
Via Variety:
The counterclaim from the Beastie Boys alleges copyright and trademark infringement, false advertising, false endorsement, unfair competition and misappropriation of California’s common law right of publicity, as well as violation of New York civil rights law.
Their counterclaim notes that the GoldieBlox advertisement, called “GoldieBlox, Rube Goldberg & Beastie Boys ‘Princess Machine’,” with altered lyrics of “Girls,” garnered more than 8 million views on YouTube and “directly resulted in a massive increase in the sales” of the company’s products and making it one of the most popular toy lines on Amazon.
“Unfortunately, rather than developing an original advertising campaign to inspire its customers to create and innovate, GoldieBlox has instead developed an advertising campaign that condones and encourages stealing from others,” the counterclaim stated.
Intellectual property is nothing worth tampering with. No word yet how much the group is asking for in damages.
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Photo: PNP/Wenn.com
