Is Nike ripping off Eddie Van Halen?
The evening news on NBC here in Los Angeles, before cutting to commercial, teased “Eddie Van Halen says he’s being ripped off. You be the judge.”
The subsequent story was about how Van Halen alleges that Nike is using his trademarked red, white and black striped guitar design for one of their shoes. The news then left it up to us to “be the judge” by showing images of Eddie Van Halen’s iconic guitar along with the shoes in question but—and this is a big but—they showed the wrong pair of sneakers. I don’t know which model they were showing, but it was a basic solid gray shoe with a black Nike swoosh and red stitching and a black or gray sole (I don’t remember exactly, but it was just a basic shoe with SOLID colors). It looked nothing like Eddie Van Halen’s stripey guitar design and would make the average person think that Van Halen is making a big deal out of nothing and is just looking to sue Nike for the money. They also showed Van Halen’s own shoe design as a comparison, which does look like his guitar.
You would think the evening news of a major metropolitan area would do a bit more research. It took me all of 1 minute to find images of the shoes in question, which are a style of Nike Dunk Lows. Now you be the real judge; is Nike ripping off Eddie Van Halen? Does he have a valid argument here?
Here’s his trademarked guitar design, his official shoe design, and the real Nkes that are the center of all this litigation:
Eddie Van Halen's trademarked guitar design.
Eddie's official shoes with his trademarked design.
The REAL shoes in question: Nike Dunk Lows
I think Eddie Van Halen may have a case here, though you wouldn’t have known it if you watched KNBC tonight.
Update: When I was looking up pictures, Tim and I noticed that Eddie’s official shoes look like Converse high tops. We didn’t think much of this, but thanks to Ace’s comment below, I now know that Converse is owned by Nike! Woah! Didn’t know that. This puts things in a new perspective. Thanks Ace!
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