Nirvana is suing Marc Jacobs International, alleging that the fashion brand is infringing on the band’s copyright for its smiley face logo. Several of the items feature the smiley face logo at issue here; the $115 t-shirt pictured below is called, literally, “Bootleg Redux Grunge,” which would seem to imply the, ahem, illegal nature of it. To recover on a copyright infringement claim, the copyright holder must show a valid copyright and that it was used unlawfully. The holder must also prove that the alleged infringer had access to the copyrighted work and that the two creations are substantially similar. All apologies to Marc Jacobs, but this one smells like a solid claim.

Source: Forbes January 01, 2019 00:33 UTC