7 ms·

'Satan Shoes' to be recalled as Nike agrees to settle lawsuit

25 points by neom 6y ago

eric4smith 6y ago
Heh... Reminds me of a scene in Billions last year with Wendy Rhoades and Taylor Mason. Taylor walked in the office and said they were atheist. Wendy asked to buy their soul for $10 and gave them a piece of paper to sign. There was a awkwardly long pause... Sure, Nike perhaps does not really care. But deep inside, the cultural programming says its not a good look.
- hu3 6y ago
  The scene for the curious like me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1f5E06X3A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1f5E06X3A
  - eric4smith 6y ago
    Thank you!
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- _carbyau_ 6y ago
  The only issue I have with selling my soul is the concept that I only have one. If I could sell my multitudes of souls to millions of people for $10 apiece I would do it in a heartbeat. But most people would feel that after the first sale I was defrauding them, so I suspect it wouldn't be worth the effort to try.
  - throw465432 6y ago
    That’s why you should only license the soul and charge monthly subscriptions. Then in the fine print, add that you’re allowed to monitor how they use it and that information belongs to you to monetize.
  - SamBam 6y ago
    I've actually been vaguely musing selling my soul as an NFT. I think it would be worth a lot more of I were a famous artist, though.
    - _carbyau_ 6y ago
      Make sure you get the clause in that you get a % cut of any future resales. That feature is about the only thing I really do like regarding NFT's for artists.
ehsankia 6y ago
The key sentence: > Limited edition shoes can fetch higher prices among collectors so it is not clear how many - if any - customers will return the products. No one who received these will return these for the original price, they're already worth orders of magnitude more as it is. This is all pretty meaningless. Why would anyone return these? If anything, it sounds to me like this is YET another layer of MSCHF playing Nike like a fiddle. By ordering this "recall", the value of those shoes shot up even higher.
- asdfaoeu 6y ago
  I'm sure they will still sell but they may be harder to sell if Nike is blocking sales. In addition we don't really know the full value of the settlement. Potentially Nike will get some cut of the profit of the shoes not returned.
  - snorlaxle 6y ago
    I'm not sure Nike would want to receive profit directly from the sales of these 'Satan Shoes.'
  - detaro 6y ago
    I'm not sure Nike would be able to block secondary sales.
- simlevesque 6y ago
  They know. It's just a good faith move.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - ada1981 6y ago
    See what you did there...
- bntyhntr 6y ago
  I don't think anyone expects to see people take advantage of the recall. Nike found themselves in the position of being associated with Satan, which isn't a good look to many people. They defended their brand while keeping a relatively low profile and that seems like a good place to keep it. Going any further would just generate more attention when all they really need is a legal admission that they're not satanists.
reducesuffering 6y ago
Truly a great example of both bold marketing and the horrid current state of outrage virility. Nas X and MSCHF knew this product would create huge viral, mostly negative, social media buzz. Outrage sells now.
- xzel 6y ago
  Outrage has always sold. You can look at cultural/artistic things similar to this, like Rock and Roll in the 70s/80s and Rap music in the 90s, to political, War on Drugs and the Patriot Act. I'm sure you could look and find similar examples every decade for hundreds of years.
  - lostgame 6y ago
    I'm gonna do it! Other people please feel free to jump in and help me refine this. :) Arguably; the 2010's are the first decade I've maybe seen without a serious incident like this I can recall, what with Eminem (and a lot of other rappers) firmly occupying the 00's. 1990's had artists such as Nirvana, Marylin Manson, and the turn of the 90's featured the controversy of N.W.A., Ice Cube, etc. The 1980's, before the rise of rap in the late 80's; featured the metal movement, with often overtly Satanic lyrics and imagery such as inverted pentagrams. Christians would often gather and burn albums by Metallica, Alice Cooper, etc. The 1970's continued the themes of psychedelia and occultism that first occurred in the 1960's, and albums by artists like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and (introducing!) Black Sabbath, were; again - super controversial, not to mention the burgeoning punk scene. The 1960's turned rock and roll into just rock; and you bet your ass those Beatles worshipped Satan, don't ya know! The 'bigger than Jesus' comment would remain in music history forever. The Beatniks and their pill-popping would raise eyebrows all over the world. The 1950's featured the hip-swinging movements of Elvis Presley, who was certainly corrupting the youth of the time, infusing them with ideas of promiscuous behaviour. :O That's probably about where I lose the plot, myself. I know jazz was controversial, but I don't know enough about the specific history around it beyond the obvious racial implications. So you can certainly go back more than 50 years and find one or more of these 'controversy-mongerers' every decade for sure. :) Outrage has always sold. Outrage goes Platinum. ;)
villgax 6y ago
Lol, this just gave them more clout
lostgame 6y ago
EDIT: I originally made this comment with the understanding that Nas literally just slapped a Nike logo onto the side of these shoes. Knowing they're made by Nike to start doesn't make his campaign any less misleading; as - obviously - I had no idea this was the case until I just found out, for example... It was pretty misleading and the dude probably could've found a shoe manufacturer to actually support him, Satan and all. Probably just not Nike.
- detaro 6y ago
  According to all I've seen, they are modified Nike shoes, not fakes. Totally not my scene, but I thought artist-modified shoes aren't exactly unusual or ill-regarded?
- rangibaby 6y ago
  > That's some fake Prada bag shit I think it's different because they started out as actual Nike shoes
- CommieBobDole 6y ago
  The shoes were made by Nike - MSCHF bought them, modified them and then resold them. I don't even understand the legal grounds for the suit - you can do whatever you want to a product you own, and you can modify and resell it as you please. Maybe there were no legal grounds - could be that Nike was just using the suit as a vehement public statement that they're not involved with the product.
  - userbinator 6y ago
    you can do whatever you want to a product you own, and you can modify and resell it as you please Not if companies like Apple and Tesla had their way...
  - gerikson 6y ago
    Nike is claiming brand dilution: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20210330/09283346519/nike-sues-mschf-over-high-profile-satan-shoes-claiming-unsafe-blood-may-dilute-exalted-nike-swoosh.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20210330/09283346519/nike-...
syrrim 6y ago
I'm maybe misunderstanding this. They took shoes from nike, and modified them in various ways, then resold them. Nike sued because they left a nike logo visible. Isn't the right of first supposed to guarantee their right to resell these shoes?
- TheDudeMan 6y ago
  Yeah... I'm still trying to figure out what the illegal part was. Maybe they used the Nike logo on a web site promoting the shoes? Or maybe they repositioned the Nike logo on the shoe? Just having the logo on the shoe wouldn't be a problem. The logo was put there by Nike.
  - habitue 6y ago
    If you materially alter the item, in a way that would surprise the consumer expecting an item with that trademark, it can be a problem. The example legal eagle on youtube gives is a sunglass manufacturer with special protective lenses. A reseller replaced the lenses, and a customer would be expecting the special lenses when they bought them with that trademark. So the court decided that change was material and found against the reseller.
- georgyo 6y ago
  There a few exceptions to the right of first sale. This video covers it in pretty good depth. https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk
- Theory5 6y ago
  >"Nike sued MSCHF last week claiming the "Satan Shoes [were] likely to cause confusion and dilution and create an erroneous association" between MSCHF's products and the company. " Nike felt the way the shoes were marketed and sold was confusing enough that people might assume these were official Nike shoes. If you're speaking about the resale doctrine when you say "right of first" in trademark law it appears that altering the goods so they are materially different is where the line is drawn.if you substantially alter them, it sounds like you don't retain the rights and protections under the resellers doctrine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine
rurounijones 6y ago
"Legal Eagle" youtube channel covers this in some depth: https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk Highly recommended to understand the legal aspects of this case and will probably cover any legal questions you may have about it (First Sale, Trademark Infringement, Parody protection etc.)
gorgoiler 6y ago
If the shoes were sold through a gallery the claim that this was all a work of art might hold water. If the joke was funnier, the parody element might have had some legs to it. The way this was presented meant it really just looked like a Nike ripoff. The artists’ lawyer claims this was a comment on “absurd collaboration culture” between brands and artists. Just kidding, it was a joke! If your joke is not funny enough to be distinguishable from a real brand collaboration then you can expect to called out for straight up trademark infringement.
- monocasa 6y ago
  The idea is that it's a collaboration between Satan and Nike. They previously did another one based on what a collab between Nike and Jesus would look like. I doubt anyone thinks Nike is doing collabs with religious figures.
- SamBam 6y ago
  > If your joke is not funny enough to be distinguishable from a real brand collaboration Do you think that there were people who actually believe Nike collaborated with Satan?

25 points by neom 6y ago

Heh... Reminds me of a scene in Billions last year with Wendy Rhoades and Taylor Mason. Taylor walked in the office and said they were atheist. Wendy asked to buy their soul for $10 and gave them a piece of paper to sign. There was a awkwardly long pause... Sure, Nike perhaps does not really care. But deep inside, the cultural programming says its not a good look.

hu3 6y ago
The scene for the curious like me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1f5E06X3A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1f5E06X3A
- eric4smith 6y ago
  Thank you!
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
_carbyau_ 6y ago
The only issue I have with selling my soul is the concept that I only have one. If I could sell my multitudes of souls to millions of people for $10 apiece I would do it in a heartbeat. But most people would feel that after the first sale I was defrauding them, so I suspect it wouldn't be worth the effort to try.
- throw465432 6y ago
  That’s why you should only license the soul and charge monthly subscriptions. Then in the fine print, add that you’re allowed to monitor how they use it and that information belongs to you to monetize.
- SamBam 6y ago
  I've actually been vaguely musing selling my soul as an NFT. I think it would be worth a lot more of I were a famous artist, though.
  - _carbyau_ 6y ago
    Make sure you get the clause in that you get a % cut of any future resales. That feature is about the only thing I really do like regarding NFT's for artists.

ehsankia 6y ago

The key sentence: > Limited edition shoes can fetch higher prices among collectors so it is not clear how many - if any - customers will return the products. No one who received these will return these for the original price, they're already worth orders of magnitude more as it is. This is all pretty meaningless. Why would anyone return these? If anything, it sounds to me like this is YET another layer of MSCHF playing Nike like a fiddle. By ordering this "recall", the value of those shoes shot up even higher.

asdfaoeu 6y ago
I'm sure they will still sell but they may be harder to sell if Nike is blocking sales. In addition we don't really know the full value of the settlement. Potentially Nike will get some cut of the profit of the shoes not returned.
- snorlaxle 6y ago
  I'm not sure Nike would want to receive profit directly from the sales of these 'Satan Shoes.'
- detaro 6y ago
  I'm not sure Nike would be able to block secondary sales.
simlevesque 6y ago
They know. It's just a good faith move.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- ada1981 6y ago
  See what you did there...
bntyhntr 6y ago
I don't think anyone expects to see people take advantage of the recall. Nike found themselves in the position of being associated with Satan, which isn't a good look to many people. They defended their brand while keeping a relatively low profile and that seems like a good place to keep it. Going any further would just generate more attention when all they really need is a legal admission that they're not satanists.

reducesuffering 6y ago

Truly a great example of both bold marketing and the horrid current state of outrage virility. Nas X and MSCHF knew this product would create huge viral, mostly negative, social media buzz. Outrage sells now.

xzel 6y ago
Outrage has always sold. You can look at cultural/artistic things similar to this, like Rock and Roll in the 70s/80s and Rap music in the 90s, to political, War on Drugs and the Patriot Act. I'm sure you could look and find similar examples every decade for hundreds of years.
- lostgame 6y ago
  I'm gonna do it! Other people please feel free to jump in and help me refine this. :) Arguably; the 2010's are the first decade I've maybe seen without a serious incident like this I can recall, what with Eminem (and a lot of other rappers) firmly occupying the 00's. 1990's had artists such as Nirvana, Marylin Manson, and the turn of the 90's featured the controversy of N.W.A., Ice Cube, etc. The 1980's, before the rise of rap in the late 80's; featured the metal movement, with often overtly Satanic lyrics and imagery such as inverted pentagrams. Christians would often gather and burn albums by Metallica, Alice Cooper, etc. The 1970's continued the themes of psychedelia and occultism that first occurred in the 1960's, and albums by artists like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and (introducing!) Black Sabbath, were; again - super controversial, not to mention the burgeoning punk scene. The 1960's turned rock and roll into just rock; and you bet your ass those Beatles worshipped Satan, don't ya know! The 'bigger than Jesus' comment would remain in music history forever. The Beatniks and their pill-popping would raise eyebrows all over the world. The 1950's featured the hip-swinging movements of Elvis Presley, who was certainly corrupting the youth of the time, infusing them with ideas of promiscuous behaviour. :O That's probably about where I lose the plot, myself. I know jazz was controversial, but I don't know enough about the specific history around it beyond the obvious racial implications. So you can certainly go back more than 50 years and find one or more of these 'controversy-mongerers' every decade for sure. :) Outrage has always sold. Outrage goes Platinum. ;)

villgax 6y ago

Lol, this just gave them more clout

lostgame 6y ago

EDIT: I originally made this comment with the understanding that Nas literally just slapped a Nike logo onto the side of these shoes. Knowing they're made by Nike to start doesn't make his campaign any less misleading; as - obviously - I had no idea this was the case until I just found out, for example... It was pretty misleading and the dude probably could've found a shoe manufacturer to actually support him, Satan and all. Probably just not Nike.

detaro 6y ago
According to all I've seen, they are modified Nike shoes, not fakes. Totally not my scene, but I thought artist-modified shoes aren't exactly unusual or ill-regarded?
rangibaby 6y ago
> That's some fake Prada bag shit I think it's different because they started out as actual Nike shoes
CommieBobDole 6y ago
The shoes were made by Nike - MSCHF bought them, modified them and then resold them. I don't even understand the legal grounds for the suit - you can do whatever you want to a product you own, and you can modify and resell it as you please. Maybe there were no legal grounds - could be that Nike was just using the suit as a vehement public statement that they're not involved with the product.
- userbinator 6y ago
  you can do whatever you want to a product you own, and you can modify and resell it as you please Not if companies like Apple and Tesla had their way...
- gerikson 6y ago
  Nike is claiming brand dilution: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20210330/09283346519/nike-sues-mschf-over-high-profile-satan-shoes-claiming-unsafe-blood-may-dilute-exalted-nike-swoosh.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20210330/09283346519/nike-...

syrrim 6y ago

I'm maybe misunderstanding this. They took shoes from nike, and modified them in various ways, then resold them. Nike sued because they left a nike logo visible. Isn't the right of first supposed to guarantee their right to resell these shoes?

TheDudeMan 6y ago
Yeah... I'm still trying to figure out what the illegal part was. Maybe they used the Nike logo on a web site promoting the shoes? Or maybe they repositioned the Nike logo on the shoe? Just having the logo on the shoe wouldn't be a problem. The logo was put there by Nike.
- habitue 6y ago
  If you materially alter the item, in a way that would surprise the consumer expecting an item with that trademark, it can be a problem. The example legal eagle on youtube gives is a sunglass manufacturer with special protective lenses. A reseller replaced the lenses, and a customer would be expecting the special lenses when they bought them with that trademark. So the court decided that change was material and found against the reseller.
georgyo 6y ago
There a few exceptions to the right of first sale. This video covers it in pretty good depth. https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk
Theory5 6y ago
>"Nike sued MSCHF last week claiming the "Satan Shoes [were] likely to cause confusion and dilution and create an erroneous association" between MSCHF's products and the company. " Nike felt the way the shoes were marketed and sold was confusing enough that people might assume these were official Nike shoes. If you're speaking about the resale doctrine when you say "right of first" in trademark law it appears that altering the goods so they are materially different is where the line is drawn.if you substantially alter them, it sounds like you don't retain the rights and protections under the resellers doctrine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine

rurounijones 6y ago

"Legal Eagle" youtube channel covers this in some depth: https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk https://youtu.be/GuYd4RP0_qk Highly recommended to understand the legal aspects of this case and will probably cover any legal questions you may have about it (First Sale, Trademark Infringement, Parody protection etc.)

gorgoiler 6y ago

If the shoes were sold through a gallery the claim that this was all a work of art might hold water. If the joke was funnier, the parody element might have had some legs to it. The way this was presented meant it really just looked like a Nike ripoff. The artists’ lawyer claims this was a comment on “absurd collaboration culture” between brands and artists. Just kidding, it was a joke! If your joke is not funny enough to be distinguishable from a real brand collaboration then you can expect to called out for straight up trademark infringement.

monocasa 6y ago
The idea is that it's a collaboration between Satan and Nike. They previously did another one based on what a collab between Nike and Jesus would look like. I doubt anyone thinks Nike is doing collabs with religious figures.
SamBam 6y ago
> If your joke is not funny enough to be distinguishable from a real brand collaboration Do you think that there were people who actually believe Nike collaborated with Satan?