French Luxury Brand Hermes Wins NFT Trademark Infringement Lawsuit

French luxury marque Hermes has won a suit against an creator who depicted its celebrated Birkin bags successful a non-fungible token (NFT) collection. The creator argued that NFTs should beryllium covered nether the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment but the assemblage disagreed.

Hermes Wins Lawsuit Against ‘Metabirkins’ NFT Creator

French luxury plan location Hermes has won a suit against Mason Rothschild, the creator down the “Metabirkins” non-fungible token (NFT) postulation which features integer depictions of Hermes’ fashionable Birkin bags.

Rothschild created the Metabirkins NFT postulation successful 2021, which helium described arsenic “a postulation of 100 unsocial NFTs created with faux fur successful a scope of modern colour and graphic executions.” The postulation has fetched much than 200 ETH successful sales, equivalent to $331,684 astatine the clip of writing. Hermes complained and sued the creator aboriginal past twelvemonth for trademark infringement.

Images from the Metabirkins NFT collection. Source: Metabirkins.

Rothschild argued that NFTs should beryllium covered nether the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment. The artist’s defence squad compared his enactment to that of Andy Warhol who depicted Campbell’s crockery cans and Coca-Cola bottles successful his artwork. Rothschild argued successful court:

These images, and the NFTs that authenticate them, are not handbags. They transportation thing but meaning.

Hermes’ lawyers person accused Rothschild of “stealing the goodwill successful Hermes’ celebrated intelligence spot to make and merchantability his ain enactment of products.” They argued that customers are apt to confuse Metabirkins NFTs with genuine Hermes products. They further said the Metabirkins URL is excessively akin to the 1 utilized by the luxury brand. Oren Warshavsky, a lawyer representing Hermes said successful court: “The crushed for these income was the Birkin name.”

After deliberating for 2 days, a New York assemblage delivered a verdict connected Wednesday stating that they “found the suspect liable for trademark infringement” and “trademark dilution.” In addition, they recovered that “the First Amendment extortion does not barroom liability.” The assemblage past awarded Hermes $133,000 successful damages — $110,000 for trademark infringement and $23,000 for cybersquatting.

Do you deliberation the NFT creator should person won this lawsuit? Let america cognize successful the comments conception below.

Image Credits: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Wiki Commons

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