The acknowledged cat and abrasion bold involving the absolute cat of cyberbanking music figure deadmau5 aloof got added intense, as the artisan has filed a countersuit adjoin the woman who owns meowingtons.com. Because his cat's name is Prof. Meowingtons and he says her business is ambagious his fans.
Joel Zimmerman is suing Emma Bassiri for brand infringement, cybersquatting and arbitrary antagonism over her site's name. She sued aboriginal in March, afterwards Zimmerman filed a address with the U.S. Patent and Brand appointment arduous her trademark.
"Two months ago, a aggregation that hijacked our clients’ brand MEOWINGTONS filed a accusation adjoin our clients, deadmau5 and his companies, including Prof. Meowingtons Ltd," advocate Irene Lee tells The Hollywood Reporter. "Despite our clients' efforts to boldness the amount amicably, the aggregation — which took the actual mark as its name: Meowingtons, LLC — has been relentless, now banishment our audience to assure their brand rights and bookish acreage by filing a counterclaim."
Zimmerman claims that in the years amid his aboriginal use of the Meowingtons mark in 2011 and Bassiri's aboriginal use of it in 2014, he awash "tens of bags of units" of accoutrement featuring his cat's moniker — and accent the Meowingtons Hax tour, which sparked an anthology and music video. (Examples of the commodity are included in the filing, which is acquaint below.)
The cyberbanking music figure says Bassiri's accumulated practices are tarnishing his — and his cat's — goodwill.
Zimmerman is additionally suing Scott Hutchison, a above Toronto DJ who manages the cat-themed commodity website. The complaint includes a amusing media screenshot of a photo Hutchison aggregate in 2010 of deadmau5 advance arena on his computer. Zimmerman says it's "simply inconceivable" that Hutchison was blind of his pet Meowingtons back the website registered its trademark.
Further, he claims a time-limited Google chase of "Meowingtons" in 2013-2014 shows assorted references to deadmau5 on the aboriginal folio of results.
"Thus, a simple Google chase of “Meowingtons” at the time would accept apparent both a articulation to deadmau5 and his use of MEOWINGTONS in business in affiliation with, at the actual least, deadmau5’s music," states the countersuit. "If Counter-Defendants absolutely affianced in activity above-mentioned to adopting the MEOWINGTONS mark, they would accept promptly baldheaded deadmau5’s use of the mark."
Now, Zimmerman doesn't aloof appetite the USPTO to abolish Bassiri's trademark, he additionally has his architect set on demography her website offline — at atomic with its accepted URL. He's gluttonous damage of the domain, additional disgorgement of profits or approved damages.
Bassiri has not yet commented on the countersuit.
This commodity originally appeared in THR.com.
