You gotta fight! For your rights! Beastie Boys settled the preemptive lawsuit brought against them by GoldieBlox, after they used the Beastie Boys’ hit “Girls” without their permission. GoldieBlox is a toy company with a mission to empower girls by “break[ing] down gender stereotypes and to encourage young girls to engage in activities that challenge their intellect, particularly in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math,” their alleged reason for using the Beastie Boys’ song in their advertisement.
The Beastie Boys had threatened a copyright infringement suit upon hearing their song in the ad without their given permission. Historically, they have refused to license their songs for commercial purposes. A stipulation in Adam Yauch’s will stated that, “in no event may my image or name or any music or any artistic property created by me be used for advertising purposes.”
While the Beastie Boys support GoldieBlox’s mission to empower girls, they stated,
“Make no mistake: Your video is an advertisement that is designed to sell a product and long ago, we made a conscious decision not to permit our music and/or name to be used in product ads. When we tried to simply ask how and why our song ‘Girls’ had been used in your ad without our permission, you sued us.”
GoldieBlox sued first, claiming that their use of the song was permitted under “fair use,” as it was a parody of the song that criticized the original. The Beastie Boys countersued over the theft of their intellectual property, which they did not believe to be protected by fair use.
On Tuesday the suit was setlled in favor of the Beastie Boys, and GoldieBlox issued a public apology on their website.
“We sincerely apologize for any negative impact our actions have had on the Beastie Boys,” the company said. “We never intended to cast the band in a negative light and we regret putting them in a position to defend themselves when they had done nothing wrong.”
Although GoldieBlox lost the legal battle, there’s a silver lining. As part of the settlement, they will give a portion of their revenue to charities selected by the Beastie Boys that support education for girls. They also garnered publicity for their company and cause.
-Brittney Borruso www.facebook.com/rockstella
You can check out our previous article on the suit here.
[via Rolling Stone]