Thursday, June 3, 2010
No Direct or Indirect Affiliation or Involvement with Copyright
"The artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude have no direct or indirect affiliation or involvement with AT&T."
This disclaimer has been appended to the current AT&T commercial "AT&T Rethink Possible - Blanket Commercial" in which silky orange fabric drapes landmarks such as the Hollywood sign, the St. Louis Arch, the Hoover Dam, and the Las Vegas strip. Hmmm. Isn't this a little like a bank robber claiming that the money he is spending has no direct or indirect affiliation or involvement with the bank it came from?
Perhaps you assumed that perhaps Christo did, in a moment of grief at Jeanne Claude's passing in November, agree to license his concept to AT&T? Were you then surprised to see this teeny-lettered disclaimer added to the end of the commercial? Apparently, directly or indirectly implied in a recent CNET news posting, AT&T actually thought they were ripping off a Bosnian/Herzegovinian cell phone company called Eronet which first ripped off Christo and Jeanne Claude in 2007.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christo_and_Jeanne-Claude
http://trendland.net/2010/05/10/att-infringes-on-the-art-of-christo-and-jeanne-claude/
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I call BS.... They put the disclaimer because other people thought it was a rip off of The Gates.... The earlier commercials did not have the disclaimer. They used orange because that is their signature color and has been since Cingular and AT&T joined... Their message (since their ad attack from Verizon) has been that they "cover America".... It would make since that you would use material to actually "cover" something. I guess I should pay the artist as I used orange material to drape over my couch (in the way of a blanket) and oh yeah, my drapes bought from Bed Bath & Beyond have orange in them, so I guess one of us owes royalties to them as well. I see similarities but that's it. Wouldn't even know who the artists were except for the hoopla surrounding the commercial.
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