Edward Chatterton

[co-author: Liam Blackford] In this article, the second in our series, we look at the various legal options brand owners have when faced with copycats and compare trends across some key regions. Dealing with counterfeits Of the types of copycats, counterfeits tend to involve IP infringement in a relatively straightforward manner.

[co-author: Liam Blackford] One of the biggest challenges facing brand owners today is the rise of the copycat. In this article (the first of our series of three), we look at the different types of copycat, their public perception, and how the market for lookalikes has grown with the rise of social media. Are all copycats the same? No – there are different types, with differences in how and to what extent they reference the original.

We previously wrote about a Chinese court decision that protected the copyright of AI-generated images in the ‘half heart’ case. However, in a recent case, the Zhangjiagang People’s Court (in China’s Jiangsu province) denied copyright protection for AI-generated works. In the new ‘butterfly chairs’ case, the plaintiff used the AI tool Midjourney to create three images. Each image depicted a distinct butterfly-shaped chair with a jelly-like texture in varying hues of pink, blue and orange.