Urban Outfitters and Forever 21 Accused of Ripping Off Tupac Images
Retailer Urban Outfitters is known, in part, for its trendy t-shirts. Whether it be a catchy slogan or a retro graphic, Urban Outfitters covers your t-shirt needs. But, where exactly does it obtain the endless supply of images for all of those shirts? Well, according to a new lawsuit, at least some of those images are pilfered from certain artists.
According to a report from Consumerist, Plaintiff Danny Clinch filed a lawsuit against Urban Outfitters and fellow retailer Forever 21 (and several other entities discussed below) alleging that the retailers infringed on his copyrights by producing t-shirts featuring images of rapper Tupac Shakur. Clinch alleges that he took the photos which were featured on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine in 1993 and 1996. The photos were copyrighted in 2002. Nonetheless, Amaru/AWA Merchandising, the company in charge of licensing TuPac merchandise, entered into a license agreement with a company called Planet Productions which purported to grant Planet a license to use the copyrighted photographs. Planet then authorized an outfit known as Bioworld Merchandising to produce the t-shirts which, in turn, were sold to Urban Outfitters and Forever 21. While Urban Outfitters and Forever 21 are the “big ticket” defendants in this matter, we don’t know what, if anything, they knew about the chain of custody surrounding the Tupac photos’ copyright. Whatever the case, this is not the first time Urban Outfitters and Forever 21 have faced such allegations. As reported by Teen Vogue:
Designer Charles Smith II and Alala founder Denise Lee both recently accused Forever 21 of ripping off their designs. On top of that, people on Twitter have been accusing Forever 21 of stealing fonts from Kanye West’s Life of Pablo merchandise and ripping off Rihanna’s Fenty x Puma sandals. Just last month, Frank Ocean accused the company of plagiarizing a font from his Blonde cover. For Urban Outfitters’ part, Coachella sued Urban Outfitters, Inc. in March over its sister company Free People’s Coachella collection, which it says was sold without the festival’s permission.
Again, who knows what, if anything, Urban Outfitters and Forever 21 knew about any of these alleged copyright infringements? However, at this point, Urban Outfitters may want to just start designing t-shirts itself just to be safe.
