Taylor Swift vs Vegas Showgirl absurdity continues | Matt Connarton Unleashed

0:00 Speaker 1: So we talked about this on the show a couple

0:02 Speaker 1: of weeks ago, this lawsuit. And you know, the thing is,

0:07 Speaker 1: when you get to be as successful as Taylor Swift,

0:10 Speaker 1: you know, you've got all the money in the world,

0:12 Speaker 1: and that's great, but you know, I mean, she's arguably

0:16 Speaker 1: one of the biggest stars in the world right not

0:18 Speaker 1: just in the United States but globally, a global icon,

0:21 Speaker 1: if you will, truly, I mean, she's ascended to that point.

0:24 Speaker 1: But when you have all the money in the world,

0:26 Speaker 1: some people want to take some of it from you.

0:28 Speaker 1: And I'm not just talking about taxes. I'm talking about

0:31 Speaker 1: people who sue you. Now we talked about this again,

0:34 Speaker 1: I forget it was either two weeks ago or three

0:36 Speaker 1: weeks ago on the show, this lawsuit. So when you

0:39 Speaker 1: have money, people sue you to try to get your money.

0:41 Speaker 1: And there is this podcaster named Maren Flagg who has

0:48 Speaker 1: a podcast called Confessions of a Showgirl, who has sued

0:54 Speaker 1: Taylor Swift over a trademark infringement because Taylor Swift has

1:00 Speaker 1: an album called Life of a Showgirl. So Maren flag

1:05 Speaker 1: her podcast is called Confessions of a Showgirl. But she

1:08 Speaker 1: apparently in her legal team feels that Taylor Swift has

1:10 Speaker 1: infringed on her trademark with her album Life of a Showgirl.

1:15 Speaker 1: So I guess and by that logic, and so we

1:18 Speaker 1: have an update. That's why we're going there's an update

1:21 Speaker 1: on this that actually really surprises me. But I was

1:26 Speaker 1: surprised by all of this and pretty critical of it

1:30 Speaker 1: because to me, it sounds like a frivolous lawsuit. You know,

1:34 Speaker 1: I mean, yes, both Life of a Showgirl and Confessions

1:38 Speaker 1: of a Showgirl have the word showgirl in them, but

1:41 Speaker 1: by the lie, if you're going to call that trademark infringement,

1:45 Speaker 1: by that logic, I guess Maren Flag with her podcast

1:49 Speaker 1: Confessions of a Showgirl, I guess you can't ever have

1:52 Speaker 1: the word showgirl and anything ever, because if you do,

1:56 Speaker 1: you're infringing on her trade. I guess she now owns

1:59 Speaker 1: all the rights to the word showgirl. You know, am

2:02 Speaker 1: I gonna end up owing this woman money for even

2:04 Speaker 1: saying the word showgirl multiple times on the show today?

2:07 Speaker 1: As we talk about this, I mean, you know, by

2:10 Speaker 1: that logic, I guess I should, right, I must owe

2:13 Speaker 1: her something. I mean, it's absurd to me, you know,

2:19 Speaker 1: Life of a Showgirl Confessions of a Showgirl not the

2:22 Speaker 1: same thing. They both use the word showgirl. They also

2:25 Speaker 1: both use the words of and uh, you know, I mean,

2:31 Speaker 1: come on. It's very silly to me, and I feel

2:34 Speaker 1: that this is a very frivolous lawsuit. And I agreed

2:37 Speaker 1: with what Taylor Swift's legal team has said about this,

2:40 Speaker 1: that it is frivolous. And this woman, Marin Flagg, this podcaster,

2:43 Speaker 1: or she's just clout chasing. A lot of podcasters do that,

2:47 Speaker 1: by the way. But there's a new wrinkle to all

2:53 Speaker 1: of this because I thought this would get thrown out.

2:55 Speaker 1: I really did. This is so obviously frivolous, but no.

3:00 Speaker 1: This is an update from a couple days ago. This

3:02 Speaker 1: is from Digitalmusicnews dot Com, one of my favorite websites

3:05 Speaker 1: for music industry news. Judge considers injunction against Taylor Swift's

3:11 Speaker 1: Life of a Showgirl branding as trademark. Battle intensifies, intensifies,

3:18 Speaker 1: So this podcaster Maren Flagg, who apparently believes that she

3:23 Speaker 1: just owns the rights to the word showgirl. She's actually

3:29 Speaker 1: getting some traction with this. I guess I really thought

3:32 Speaker 1: this would have gone away by now. I would have

3:34 Speaker 1: thought this would have gotten thrown out for being frivolous,

3:36 Speaker 1: but no, so it says here again. This is from

3:39 Speaker 1: the article from Digital Musicnews dot com. A judge weighs

3:42 Speaker 1: an injunction against Taylor Swift's Life of a Showgirl branding

3:46 Speaker 1: and light of her trademark's prior suspension due to actual

3:51 Speaker 1: showgirl Maren Wade's own trademark. Oh, by the way, so

3:58 Speaker 1: about the name, because I said Maren fla. Maren Flag

4:01 Speaker 1: is her legal name. But she's a former Vegas showgirl

4:07 Speaker 1: named Maren Wade, so I guess Maren Wade is her

4:10 Speaker 1: stage name. Maren Flagg is her legal name. So just

4:15 Speaker 1: in case anyone's confused about the Maren's because I was

4:17 Speaker 1: thrown by that. For a second. Again, I think this

4:20 Speaker 1: is I think this is absurd. I can't believe this

4:23 Speaker 1: is happening. Don't get me wrong. I mean again, Taylor

4:25 Speaker 1: Swift has all the money in the world. It's not

4:26 Speaker 1: like I feel sorry for her and this kind of

4:28 Speaker 1: thing happens. But this is really absurd to me. But

4:32 Speaker 1: I'm not a legal expert of any kind. I'm a layman.

4:34 Speaker 1: You know I'm not. I mean, I do know, I

4:36 Speaker 1: do have some knowledge about intellectual property and trademark and

4:40 Speaker 1: copyright and all that kind of thing, just because of

4:42 Speaker 1: some of the work that I've done in the music industry.

4:45 Speaker 1: But I so I'm not a lawyer, I'm not a

4:49 Speaker 1: legal expert. I'm probably speaking out of turn here, but

4:54 Speaker 1: this just seems absurd to me. All Right, So let's

4:58 Speaker 1: look at this article. Here's the update on this. If

5:01 Speaker 1: you thought former Vegas Showgirl Maren Wade legal name Maren Flagg,

5:05 Speaker 1: was trying to ride Taylor Swift's coattails over the latter's

5:09 Speaker 1: Life of a Showgirl branding, think again when I still

5:13 Speaker 1: think that. When Taylor Swift's team tried to file their

5:16 Speaker 1: trademark for the megastar's latest album, it was suspended after

5:20 Speaker 1: they discovered a pre existing trademark for flags similarly named

5:25 Speaker 1: Confessions of a Showgirl. Even the trademark office thought there

5:29 Speaker 1: could be confusion between the two entities. Okay, let's stop

5:33 Speaker 1: on that for a moment, because I know a little

5:35 Speaker 1: bit about how this part works when you file for

5:38 Speaker 1: a trademark on something. Because apparently when Taylor Swift went

5:47 Speaker 1: when her team, when her representation filed for the trademark,

5:51 Speaker 1: I still find this even this is hard to believe,

5:54 Speaker 1: but apparently when they filed for the trademark Life of

5:56 Speaker 1: a Showgirl, it was initially rejected for being too similar

6:01 Speaker 1: to another existing trademark. Now that that part surprises me,

6:07 Speaker 1: but it's not unusual when you file for a trademark.

6:13 Speaker 1: Sometimes you get rejected on the first pass because you

6:19 Speaker 1: have to supply additional You have to make some clarifications

6:22 Speaker 1: about what exactly the branding the trademark that you're filing for,

6:26 Speaker 1: what it's going to be used for, how it's going

6:27 Speaker 1: to be used, and if there is a concern that

6:31 Speaker 1: it's too close to an existing trademark, you have to

6:34 Speaker 1: kind of you have to supply documentation or explanations explaining

6:41 Speaker 1: why it's not and why there is not going to

6:43 Speaker 1: be any confusion, because again, we're talking about two different things.

6:47 Speaker 1: Not only you know, I'm sorry the word showgirl is

6:50 Speaker 1: in both names, but that's not enough from my perspective.

6:52 Speaker 1: Not only that, but Life of a show Girl is

6:55 Speaker 1: the name of an album by Taylor Swift, Confessions of

7:00 Speaker 1: a Showgirl is the name of a podcast by a

7:03 Speaker 1: former Las Vegas showgirl. To me, those two things are

7:07 Speaker 1: different enough that no one is going to be confused.

7:11 Speaker 1: No one is going to be confused. But very often

7:15 Speaker 1: when you file for a trademark, it does it may

7:18 Speaker 1: get reject I know because I've done it. It may

7:20 Speaker 1: get rejected on the first attempt, and you might have

7:24 Speaker 1: to supply, you might have to resubmit and supply additional

7:27 Speaker 1: information and clarifications. So I'm surprised the trademark off Is

7:31 Speaker 1: even rejected it the first time as being too similar.

7:34 Speaker 1: But they did apparently they did. We know that. But

7:40 Speaker 1: so Swift her team then had to resubmit it. I

7:43 Speaker 1: assume they made whatever clarifications they needed to and were

7:47 Speaker 1: able to trademark Life of a Showgirl. So again, it's

7:50 Speaker 1: just not unusual for that to go that way. It happens, Okay, Now,

7:55 Speaker 1: according to the article the initial rejection, it says that's

7:59 Speaker 1: an important detail because it proves that Swift's team was

8:02 Speaker 1: aware of Flag's brand ahead of time, but opted to

8:06 Speaker 1: go ahead with their own showgirl project. Okay, so we

8:11 Speaker 1: do know, right, So, as the article points out, so

8:15 Speaker 1: Swift's legal team knew, I mean, they probably didn't know,

8:19 Speaker 1: or they may not have known when they filed the

8:20 Speaker 1: initial trademark. But when they had to submit a follow

8:24 Speaker 1: up to get the trademark. They knew about Confessions of

8:28 Speaker 1: a Showgirl Megan Wade's podcast, But again, so what clearly

8:34 Speaker 1: two different things, So what who cares? Okay, it says here.

8:38 Speaker 1: The lawsuit filed by Flag and her team argued that

8:42 Speaker 1: Swift's massive commercial footprint has caused reverse confusion quote unquote,

8:48 Speaker 1: that's their term. I didn't know this was a thing.

8:50 Speaker 1: You know, you hear terms like reverse discrimination and things

8:52 Speaker 1: like that. I didn't know about reverse confusion. That must

8:56 Speaker 1: be a legal term, reverse confusion that effectively erodes and

8:58 Speaker 1: absorbs her decade old federally registered Confessions of a Showgirl trademark.

9:05 Speaker 1: Swift's team clapped back, stating that her album is an

9:09 Speaker 1: expressive work protected by the First Amendment, making an injunction

9:14 Speaker 1: extreme and unnecessary. They also took it a step further,

9:19 Speaker 1: asserting that Flag rode Swift's enormous marketing machine for eight

9:25 Speaker 1: and a half months and reaping all the benefits of

9:29 Speaker 1: potential confusion between the two brands before filing her lawsuit. Yeah,

9:40 Speaker 1: and there is evidence of that of Megan Flag trying

9:44 Speaker 1: to ride the coattails. See, you can't you can't try

9:48 Speaker 1: to lag. I mean, look, it's smart. You can you

9:52 Speaker 1: can overshoot and end up looking desperate, which Megan Flag,

9:56 Speaker 1: Megan Wade whatever you want to call her, not Megan Maren,

9:59 Speaker 1: sorry the podcaster. You can overshoot and end up looking

10:04 Speaker 1: desperate if you're not careful. But anytime, and this is

10:07 Speaker 1: one of the first things I learned in the music industry,

10:09 Speaker 1: anytime that you can somehow associate yourself with an entity

10:14 Speaker 1: of some sort that is bigger than you, it can

10:16 Speaker 1: only help you, right, It adds to your credibility. These days,

10:20 Speaker 1: we refer to it as social proof. Right, anytime that

10:23 Speaker 1: you can associate with an entity that is bigger than you,

10:25 Speaker 1: that can be helpful as long as it's a positive association.

10:29 Speaker 1: So I can see why the podcaster would attempt to

10:34 Speaker 1: do that. But you can't try to do that. And then,

10:38 Speaker 1: I mean, again, I'm not a legal expert, but I'm

10:41 Speaker 1: just thinking about this logically, you can't try to do

10:44 Speaker 1: that intentionally, go out of your way to associate with

10:47 Speaker 1: something bigger, a larger entity, and then turn around and

10:50 Speaker 1: say that larger entity has harmed me. Because that larger

10:54 Speaker 1: entity what they harmed you? By creating what you ended

10:59 Speaker 1: up using as an opportunity to try to boost your

11:01 Speaker 1: own profile, and then when that didn't work out for you,

11:05 Speaker 1: you turn around and you file a lawsuit. This is

11:08 Speaker 1: this is so frivolous to me. I can't believe this

11:10 Speaker 1: is still going on. Okay, it says here Taylor Swift's

11:16 Speaker 1: trademark application. This is an important detail. Taylor Swift's trademark

11:20 Speaker 1: application for Life of a Showgirl, filed by her intellectual

11:24 Speaker 1: property management company, Task Rights Management, hit a major roadblock

11:30 Speaker 1: at the United States Patent and Trademark Office back in March.

11:34 Speaker 1: Rather than being simply approved, the application was hit with

11:37 Speaker 1: a non final likelihood of confusion refusal and was officially suspended.

11:47 Speaker 1: That means that, while no action has been taken thus far,

11:50 Speaker 1: the judge has concluded hearings on the matter by stating

11:54 Speaker 1: that she quote planned to issue a written ruling shortly

11:59 Speaker 1: unquote In theory, that could mean a legal injunction against

12:05 Speaker 1: Taylor Swift's branding, given that Flag's own legal trademark precedes it.

12:11 Speaker 1: It's the latest interesting twist in what seemed at face

12:14 Speaker 1: value like a potentially frivolous lawsuit. And that's that's the update.

12:19 Speaker 1: So this is a this is a new twist. Uh again, Uh,

12:24 Speaker 1: this is a potentially frivolous lawsuit. This is a frivolous lawsuit.

12:28 Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sorry, they're not They're not the same thing.

12:32 Speaker 1: And you know what, this kind of reminds me of

12:35 Speaker 1: though when I think about Actually, I'm gonna look this up.

12:43 Speaker 1: There was a band. Okay, so for years and years

12:46 Speaker 1: and years there was a band, well, Guns n' Roses,

12:52 Speaker 1: the Axel Rose would would talk about this album called

12:56 Speaker 1: Chinese Democracy, and it was a weird thing. Like for

13:01 Speaker 1: those of you who are old enough to remember, Chinese

13:04 Speaker 1: Democracy was talked about and floating around in the ether

13:10 Speaker 1: for I mean, I don't know, it might have been

13:12 Speaker 1: more than a decade before it finally came out, and

13:17 Speaker 1: it was this really weird situation where I guess Axel

13:21 Speaker 1: Rose just really liked that title Chinese Democracy, and thought

13:24 Speaker 1: that would be a great name, the perfect name for

13:27 Speaker 1: the next Guns n' Roses album. Because the title of

13:30 Speaker 1: the album was announced as being Chinese Democracy in theory

13:35 Speaker 1: before anything was even recorded for it. It was just like,

13:37 Speaker 1: which is weird? I always thought that was so bizarre

13:43 Speaker 1: that he decided the name and announced the name like

13:49 Speaker 1: before there was ever even a hint that the album

13:53 Speaker 1: was going to be coming out, and it became just

13:56 Speaker 1: this running joke. Oh yeah, there's there's this make believe

13:59 Speaker 1: autu called Chinese Democracy by Guns n' Roses that we

14:03 Speaker 1: all know is never going to come out, by the way, eventually,

14:05 Speaker 1: it did eventually, But that title existed for so long,

14:11 Speaker 1: and for whatever reason, Axel Rose was so committed to

14:15 Speaker 1: the idea, the concept that that was going to be

14:17 Speaker 1: the name of the album. So finally, somebody, and forgive me,

14:21 Speaker 1: I cannot remember who it was, so I'm looking it up.

14:24 Speaker 1: I'm trying to google this as quickly as I can

14:26 Speaker 1: while I'm live on the air. Another band tried to

14:34 Speaker 1: call their album Chinese Democracy. What band tried to steal

14:41 Speaker 1: the name? Which I thought at the time was hilarious.

14:44 Speaker 1: Oh it was the Offspring. I found it. The Offspring

14:50 Speaker 1: punk band. The Offspring tried to steal the Chinese Democracy

14:54 Speaker 1: name from Guns n' Roses in April of two thousand

14:56 Speaker 1: and three. Capitalizing on Axel Roses lengthy and releasing the album,

15:01 Speaker 1: the Offspring issued a press release announcing their new album

15:05 Speaker 1: would be titled Chinese Democracy, and then in parentheses, you snooze,

15:10 Speaker 1: you Lose. That was gonna be the full title, Chinese Democracy,

15:13 Speaker 1: You choose, you snooze, you Lose. Axel Roses Camp quickly

15:17 Speaker 1: responded with a cease and desist order. The Offspring eventually

15:21 Speaker 1: dropped the name and released their record as Splinter. I

15:25 Speaker 1: always I always thought that was hilarious when the Offspring

15:32 Speaker 1: did that Chinese Democracy, you snooze, you Lose. Oh and

15:36 Speaker 1: by the way, because I'm looking at it here, it was.

15:38 Speaker 2: Fourteen years, fourteen years of this mythical, mysterious album called

15:45 Speaker 2: Chinese Democracy by Guns n' Roses, fourteen years until it

15:49 Speaker 2: finally came out at but sure enough.

15:54 Speaker 1: He went with that title. He just really loved that title,

15:57 Speaker 1: I guess. But yeah, the Offspring, uh, the Offspring, that

16:01 Speaker 1: was I guess it was an April Fool's joke by them,

16:08 Speaker 1: according to this other article that I'm looking at. But yeah,

16:11 Speaker 1: they went with that title and they got to see

16:12 Speaker 1: some disci But see a lot of how does that

16:15 Speaker 1: even work because a lot of albums just like a

16:18 Speaker 1: lot of song titles, you know, there's a lot of

16:19 Speaker 1: song titles where you know, you think about a song

16:22 Speaker 1: title and you say, well, there's a million songs that

16:24 Speaker 1: have that title, and there's there certainly are albums where

16:28 Speaker 1: more than one artist has the same album title. I

16:33 Speaker 1: just want to see if there's any other examples of this.

16:35 Speaker 1: Are there other examples? God bless ai, are there other

16:40 Speaker 1: examples of this type of thing? And just see if

16:47 Speaker 1: there are, because I'm curious now that we're talking about this.

16:54 Speaker 1: While direct attempts to hijack a highly anticipated album name

16:58 Speaker 1: to troll a rival are rare, the music industry has

17:01 Speaker 1: seen several famous battles over stolen album titles, parody naming wars,

17:05 Speaker 1: and branding beefs. Oh, there's a few of them here,

17:08 Speaker 1: all right, let's look at this. The first one limp

17:11 Speaker 1: Biscuit versus Ministry. In two thousand and one, Fred Durst

17:16 Speaker 1: announced a highly anticipated new Olympiscuit album would be titled

17:19 Speaker 1: less than Zero. Hearing this, Al Jorgensen, frontman of the

17:23 Speaker 1: industrial metal band Ministry, decided to mess with them. Ministry

17:27 Speaker 1: quickly announced that their upcoming album would also be called

17:31 Speaker 1: less than Zero to steal olymp Biscuits thunder Durst backed

17:36 Speaker 1: down and changed his album title to chocolate starfish on

17:39 Speaker 1: the hot dog flavored water, while Ministry eventually released their

17:42 Speaker 1: album as how do you even say that? In amsist?

17:48 Speaker 1: I can't even say it. Long word starts with a

17:51 Speaker 1: probably a made up word. But uh yeah, I didn't

17:54 Speaker 1: know about that. I did not know about that. But

17:56 Speaker 1: less than Zero. That's also the name of a movie,

17:59 Speaker 1: less than Zero. If this album had come out as

18:03 Speaker 1: lesson zero, would one of the producers of the movie

18:05 Speaker 1: sue Limpiscuit for that? I mean, why not? I mean,

18:08 Speaker 1: if they had the same legal team as Maren Wade

18:11 Speaker 1: the Podcaster, I'm sure they would. Let's see the Replacements

18:18 Speaker 1: versus the Beatles. Oh, the Replacements tried to release an

18:22 Speaker 1: album called let It Be. Can't do that Ugly Kid

18:25 Speaker 1: Joe versus Two Live Crew over the title as ugly

18:30 Speaker 1: as they want to be. Yeah, there's a bunch of

18:32 Speaker 1: examples of it. But yeah, good stuff. But anyway, I

18:39 Speaker 1: just say all that to say Marin Wade, Maren whatever,

18:42 Speaker 1: the Podcaster, her lawsuit is frivolous.