Influencer Lawsuit Could Change Online Landscape for Creators

If you post online content, either individually or in connection with your job or business, you probably already know not to steal anybody’s intellectual property. Things like songs, logos, designs, or phrases belong to whomever publishes them, and ripping those off and claiming those as your own can get you sued.

But what about copying another influencer’s, business’ or pages’ look? Their general style, décor, or “vibe?” That’s exactly the question that is about to be decided in a lawsuit pitting two social media influencers against each other.

Can a Neutral Palette Be Stolen?

The lawsuit involves an influencer whose videos, where she often reviews Amazon products, take place in her home, a home decorated with very basic neutral colors, beige colors, and a generally clean, spartan aesthetic look. It is a colorless (by her own admission), plain, but cohesive and calming look.

That aesthetic apparently helps her sell products online through affiliate links; the clean and uncluttered look helps highlight the products in the room, or the products she suggests to viewers.

But she is now being sued by a fellow influencer who claims that she stole her look and visual aesthetic from the other influencer. In fact, their homes, where they film content, look almost the same from the inside.

Too Common for Protection?

And while there are similarities to the looks, layout and color panel of the room, she is defending the lawsuit by saying that her layout is not unique, it is not special, but rather it is commonplace, and thus, anybody can use it—it is just too common to have any trademark protection.

But the influencer suing her says that the videos are common in more than visual room layouts or colors; she says that the other influencer’s speaking style, camera angles, the exact types of furniture, even the influencer’s looks, are strikingly similar. They even have the same tattoo in the same place.

She says that as she is being copied more and more, her earnings from her site have declined.

What Is or Is Not Creative?

The real question is whether there is actually anything creative that can be protected via copyright or trademark. In general, tropes, or general looks, cannot be protected because they are too common. And that means that a jury would have to find that the looks of an influencer’s videos, without more (like a slogan), are unique enough to be protected.

If they are, that could lead to a “wild west” scenario, with influencers suing each other at will, alleging infringement of what on the surface would appear to be very general looks or layouts or styles of speaking or presentation.

To decide the case, a court will have to decide what is creative (and thus protectable) and what isn’t, something courts aren’t often very good at doing. The result could either stifle creative content, or make it harder for creators to protect their content from potential infringers.

Protect your  intellectual property. Call the West Palm Beach commercial litigation lawyers at Pike & Lustig today.

Sources:

theverge.com/2024/11/26/24303161/amazon-influencers-lawsuit-copyright-clean-aesthetic-girl-sydney-nicole-gifford-alyssa-sheil

theweek.com/law/the-influencer-court-case-shaking-up-social-media