Copyright
Mariah Carey has won a federal court ruling dismissing a copyright lawsuit over her perennial holiday classic “All I Want for Christmas is You” – a decision that cited an expert who said the songs mostly just shared “Christmas song clichés.”
In a ruling issued Wednesday, Judge Mónica Ramírez Almadani rejected allegations from songwriter Vince Vance that Carey and others had stolen key elements of her Christmas blockbuster from his 1989 song of the same name.
Ruling that Vance had failed to show that the songs were similar enough to violate copyright law, the judge cited analysis by a musicologist who said the two tracks were “very different songs” that shared only “commonplace Christmas song clichés” that had been used in many earlier tracks.
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“Plaintiffs have not met their burden of showing that [the songs by] Carey and Vance are substantially similar under the extrinsic test,” Ramírez Almadani wrote, using the legal term for how courts assess such allegations.
The judge not only tossed out Vance’s case, but also ruled that he and his lawyers should be punished for filing “frivolous” arguments. Calling it “egregious” conduct that aimed to “cause unnecessary delay and needlessly increase the costs of litigation,” the judge ordered that Vance and his lawyers to repay the legal bills Carey incurred defending those arguments.
Vance (real name Andy Stone) first sued Carey in 2022, claiming “All I Want” infringed the copyrights to a 1989 song of the exact same name recorded by his Vince Vance and the Valiants. Vance claimed that the earlier track received “extensive airplay” during the 1993 holiday season — a year before Carey released her now-better-known hit.
“Carey has … palmed off these works with her incredulous origin story, as if those works were her own,” Vance wrote in his latest complaint. “Her hubris knowing no bounds, even her co-credited songwriter doesn’t believe the story she has spun.”
Vance’s allegations were a big deal because Carey’s song is big business. The 1994 blockbuster, which became even more popular after it was featured in the 2003 holiday rom-com Love Actually, has re-taken the top spot on the Hot 100 for six straight years and earned a whopping $8.5 million in global revenue in 2022.
Carey’s attorneys asked the judge to end the case last year, arguing that the two songs shared only generic similarities that are firmly in the public domain – including basic Christmas terminology and a simple message that’s been used in “legions of Christmas songs.”
“The claimed similarities are an unprotectable jumble of elements: a title and hook phrase used by many earlier Christmas songs, other commonplace words, phrases, and Christmas tropes like ‘Santa Claus’ and ‘mistletoe,’ and a few unprotectable pitches and chords randomly scattered throughout these completely different songs,” Carey’s attorneys wrote at the time.
In Wednesday’s ruling, Ramírez Almadani granted that motion by endorsing two reports from musicologists hired by Carey’s lawyers that strongly rejected Vance’s allegations. In one report, New York University professor Lawrence Ferrara testified that he had found “at least 19 songs” that incorporated the same lyrical idea as “All I Want” that had been released prior to Vance’s track.
“[Vance] and [Carey] in their entirety are very different songs and the only element of similarity is the use of a common lyrical idea and Christmas song clichés that were in common use prior to [Vance],” Ferrara wrote in the report that the judge cited.
Vance’s attorneys submitted their own expert reports supporting his allegations, but the judge rejected them as evidence – saying that one was “not based on sufficient facts or data” and was “not the product of reliable principles and methods” as required by existing legal precedents.
Neither side immediately returned requests for comment.
A federal judge is shaking up Limp Bizkit’s $200 million lawsuit against Universal Music Group (UMG), issuing a procedural ruling that sends much of the contentious legal battle to state court but allows copyright claims to move ahead toward trial.
In a decision issued Tuesday (March 19), Judge Percy Anderson said he would decline to exercise jurisdiction over the majority of the lawsuit’s accusations against UMG, including its core claim that the band is entitled to a ruling of “rescission” that voids its deals with the label and allows it to take back copyrights to its music.
Citing concerns about “economy, convenience [and] fairness,” the judge ruled that those claims must instead be handled by state courts in New York or California. But he denied UMG’s motion to dismiss the band’s claim of copyright infringement, allowing those claims to proceed in his court.
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Though hardly a slam dunk, the ruling is a positive development for Limp Bizkit. In an earlier ruling, Judge Anderson had outright rejected the rescission claim — a holding that also meant the band couldn’t sue the label for copyright infringement. In the new decision, the judge left the question of rescission open for a future ruling by a state court, meaning that claim — and the lucrative copyright claims — are back in play.
Though the copyright claims will now move forward in his court, the judge has repeatedly stressed that those allegations can only succeed if the band’s contracts with UMG are rescinded and it regains its ownership of the copyrights. The judge could potentially pause the case while the rescission issue is litigated in state court, but he gave no indication that he would do so in Tuesday’s decision.
Frontman Fred Durst and Limp Bizkit sued in October, claiming the band had “never received any royalties from UMG” despite its huge success over the years: “The band had still not been paid a single cent by UMG in any royalties until taking action.” The band argued that the damages total owed by UMG would “easily surpass $200 million” when the case was over.
But in January, Judge Anderson sided with UMG on the core question of rescission. He ruled that the band had in fact been “paid millions in advances” and that UMG had fronted “substantial sums” to record and distribute Limp Bizkit’s albums — meaning the band didn’t deserve the drastic remedy of terminating the decades-old deals in their entirety.
“Plaintiffs seek rescission of contracts that have governed the parties’ relationship beginning in 1996 — nearly 30 years — because the agreements should be rescinded as fraudulently induced,” the judge wrote. “Plaintiffs have not plausibly alleged the type of ‘substantial’ or ‘total failure’ in the performance of the contracts that could support rescission of the parties’ agreements.”
Following that ruling, Limp Bizkit responded by filing an updated version of the lawsuit. In it, the band added new factual allegations to support their demand for rescission, including that its former manager had fraudulently induced them to sign agreements, engaging in “wrongful self-dealing” while the band was “paid nothing.”
In Tuesday’s decision, Judge Anderson said those new allegations would require the kind of detailed analysis of novel state-law issues that a state-level court was better suited to address.
“The rescission claims, on which the copyright claims depend, … require an analysis of state law of both New York and California law involving facts and law that are distinct from those necessary to adjudicate the copyright claim,” the judge wrote. “Plaintiffs’ effort to rescind the agreements as a result of the alleged fraud committed by their former business manager appears to also raise complex and novel theories for which there is limited controlling legal precedent.”
Miley Cyrus has lost her initial bid to dismiss a copyright case claiming her chart-topping “Flowers” ripped off the Bruno Mars song “When I Was Your Man,” allowing the high-profile lawsuit to proceed toward a trial.
Seeking to end the case at the outset, attorneys for Cyrus had argued that the plaintiff who filed the lawsuit lacked the legal “standing” to pursue it. The case was filed not by Mars himself, but a financial entity called Tempo Music Investments that bought the rights of his co-writer Philip Lawrence.
But in a ruling issued Tuesday, a Los Angeles federal judge rejected that argument, calling it “incorrect” and a “misunderstanding” of existing legal precedents.
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“Tempo now steps into Lawrence’s shoes and is a co‐owner of the exclusive rights of the copyright,” Judge Dean D. Pregerson wrote. “Because Lawrence as a co‐owner could sue for infringement, Tempo as co‐owner, in lieu of Lawrence, can sue for infringement without joining the other co‐owners of the copyright.”
Attorneys for Cyrus called Tempo’s partial ownership a “fatal and incurable defect in plaintiff’s claim,” but Judge Pregerson ruled that endorsing the star’s argument would be a radical shift in the legal landscape and have a profound economic and creative impact.
“Such a limitation would diminish the value of jointly owned copyrights, because buyers would be less interested in purchasing a copyright that they cannot enforce, thereby disincentivizing co‐authorship and collaboration in works,” the judge wrote. “This would undermine Congress’s intent.”
In rejecting it, the judge took Miley’s argument to its rational endpoint: “If, as songwriter defendants’ arguments seem to suggest, a co‐owner’s right to sue for infringement is lost upon transfer, then if all original co‐authors transferred their interest, the copyright could never be enforced.”
Tuesday’s ruling is only an initial decision, and does not mean that Tempo will win its case against Cyrus. As it moves ahead, her attorneys will pivot to more substantive arguments – that her song simply did not infringe the Mars hit because they share only “unprotected ideas and musical building blocks.”
Attorneys for both sides did not immediately return requests for comment on Tuesday.
“Flowers,” which spent eight weeks atop the Hot 100, has been linked to “Your Man” since it was released in January 2023. Many fans immediately saw it as an “answer song,” with lyrics that clearly referenced Mars’ song. The reason, according to internet sleuths, was that “Your Man” was a favorite of Cyrus’ ex-husband Liam Hemsworth — and her allusions were a nod to their divorce.
When “Flowers” was first released, legal experts told Billboard that Cyrus was likely not violating copyrights simply by using similar lyrics to fire back at the earlier song — a time-honored music industry tradition utilized by songs ranging from Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama” to countless rap diss records.
But Tempo sued in September, claiming “Flowers” had lifted numerous elements beyond the clap-back lyrics, including “melodic and harmonic material,” “pitch ending pattern,” and “bass-line structure.” Tempo, which had purchased a fractional share in the song from co-writer Lawrence, argued it was “undeniable” that Cyrus’ hit “would not exist” if not for “Your Man.”
In her motion to dismiss the case, attorneys for Miley said that the total lack of involvement from Mars and the song’s two other co-writers was not some procedural quirk in the case, but rather a fatal flaw: “Without the consent of the other owners, a grant of rights from just one co-owner does not confer standing.”
Karol G and Universal Music Group (UMG) are facing a copyright infringement lawsuit over a track from the Colombian superstar’s chart-topping album Mañana Será Bonito. In a case filed in Miami federal court, producers Ocean Vibes (Jack Hernandez) and Alfr3d Beats (Dick Alfredo Caballero Rodriguez) say the singer and her co-writers stole key elements of […]
Miley Cyrus seems unlikely to immediately escape a copyright lawsuit filed over allegations that her Grammy-winning “Flowers” infringed the Bruno Mars song “When I Was Your Man.”
A Los Angeles federal judge “repeatedly indicated” at a live court hearing Monday that he would likely deny a motion to dismiss the case filed last year by attorneys for Cyrus, according to a report by Rolling Stone.
In that motion, the singer had argued that the plaintiff in the case – not Mars himself, but an financial entity called Tempo Music Investments that bought out the rights of one of his co-writers – lacked the necessary legal “standing” to pursue its claims.
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But at the hearing, Judge Dean D. Pregerson appeared skeptical, according to RS – at times seeming to endorse arguments from Tempo’s lawyers that granting the motion would gut longstanding music industry practices. He reportedly asked Cyrus’ lawyer why anyone would buy partial shares in songs “knowing they could never enforce it” without the consent of all the other songwriters.
The judge did not immediately decide the motion at Monday’s hearing and will instead issue a written ruling in the weeks or months ahead.
“Flowers,” which spent eight weeks atop the Hot 100, has been linked to “Your Man” since it was released in January 2023. Many fans immediately saw it as an “answer song,” with lyrics that clearly referenced Mars’ song. The reason, according to internet sleuths, was that “Your Man” was a favorite of Cyrus’ ex-husband Liam Hemsworth – and her allusions were a nod to their divorce.
When “Flowers” was first released, legal experts told Billboard that Cyrus was likely not violating copyrights simply by using similar lyrics to fire back at the earlier song – a time-honored music industry tradition utilized by songs ranging from Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama” to countless rap diss records.
But Tempo sued in September, claiming “Flowers” had lifted numerous elements beyond the clap-back lyrics, including “melodic and harmonic material,” “pitch ending pattern,” and “bass-line structure.” Tempo, which had purchased a fractional share in the song from co-writer Philip Lawrence, argued it was “undeniable” that Cyrus’ hit “would not exist” if not for “Your Man.”
In her first response in November, attorneys for Miley said that the total lack of involvement from Mars and the song’s two other co-writers was not some procedural quirk in the case, but rather a “fatal flaw” that required the outright dismissal of the lawsuit.
“Plaintiff unambiguously [says] that it obtained its claimed rights in the ‘When I Was Your Man’ copyright from only one of that musical composition’s four co-authors,” wrote Peter Anderson, the star’s lead attorney. “That is a fatal and incurable defect in plaintiff’s claim.”
In a statement at the time, Tempo Music lead counsel Alex Weingarten told Billboard that the argument from Cyrus was “intellectually dishonest” and that the group clearly had standing to pursue the lawsuit: “They’re seeking to make bogus technical arguments because they don’t have an actual substantive defense to the case.”
If the motion is denied, lawyers for Cyrus will likely shift focus to those substantive arguments. In previous filings, they have argued that the two songs have “striking differences” and that any similarities are not covered by copyright law: “The songwriter defendants categorically deny copying, and the allegedly copied elements are random, scattered, unprotected ideas and musical building blocks.”
The legal battle over whether Ed Sheeran’s “Thinking Out Loud” infringed Marvin Gaye‘s “Let’s Get It On” has reached the U.S. Supreme Court more than a decade after Sheeran’s hit was released.
In a petition filed last week, a company that owns a stake in the rights to Gaye’s 1973 song urged the justices to overturn a November ruling by a lower appeals court, which said Sheeran had done nothing wrong and that the two tracks shared only “fundamental musical building blocks.”
The company, Structured Asset Sales (SAS), says that the ruling unfairly restricted its allegations to written sheet music rather than all elements included in Gaye’s iconic recorded version. That thorny issue, which has also cropped up in other major cases over “Blurred Lines” and “Stairway To Heaven” in recent years, must finally be resolved by the high court, the company says.
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“The rights of thousands of legacy musical composers and artists, of many of the most beloved and enduring pieces of popular music, are at the center of the controversy,” SAS’s lawyers write in the petition, filed with the high court Thursday (March 6).
Such an appeal, known as a petition for a writ of certiorari, faces long odds. The Supreme Court takes less than 2% of the roughly 7,000 cases it receives each year, hearing only the disputes it deems most important to the national legal landscape.
Sheeran has faced multiple lawsuits over “Thinking,” a 2014 track co-written with Amy Wadge that reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and ultimately spent 58 weeks on the chart. He was first sued by the daughter of Ed Townsend, who co-wrote the famed 1973 tune with Gaye. That case ended in a high-profile jury verdict that cleared Sheeran of any wrongdoing.
Thursday’s petition came in a separate case filed by SAS, an entity owned by industry executive David Pullman that controls a different stake in Townsend’s copyrights to the legendary song. That suit was rejected in November by the federal Second Circuit appeals court, which said the lawsuit was essentially seeking “a monopoly over a combination of two fundamental musical building blocks.”
“The four-chord progression at issue—ubiquitous in pop music—even coupled with a syncopated harmonic rhythm, is too well-explored to meet the originality threshold that copyright law demands,” the appeals court wrote. “Overprotecting such basic elements would threaten to stifle creativity and undermine the purpose of copyright law.”
Appealing that ruling to the Supreme Court last week, attorneys for SAS argued the lower court had botched the case by relying only on the “deposit copy” — a bare-bones written version of music sent to the U.S. Copyright Office for many old songs. Doing so was not only legally erroneous but also out of step with reality, the company’s lawyers wrote.
“Nobody who understands the music industry would ever suggest that songwriters consult the deposit copies on file with the Copyright Office as part of their creative (or clearance) process,” SAS wrote to the justices. “To the extent they are aware of the music that preceded them, it is from hearing it on the radio, in movies, television and—for the last quarter century—the Internet.”
That ruling was even more legally problematic, SAS’s lawyers write, because it came in the wake of a Supreme Court decision last year that said courts should afford less deference to legal guidance from federal agencies. By siding with Sheeran — and an agency interpretation from the Copyright Office — SAS says the lower appeals court “openly defied this Court.”
Sheeran’s attorneys can file a response brief in the weeks ahead. The court will decide whether or not to hear the case at some point in the next several months.
The U.S. Copyright Office posted a notice of inquiry on Monday (Feb. 10) in the Federal Registrar, requesting more information about issues related to American-based performance rights organizations (PROs).
More specifically, the Copyright Office is requesting public comment on “factors that may be contributing to the formation of new PROs”; whether there have been “increased financial and administrative costs imposed on licensees associated with paying royalties to additional PROs”; and “how to improve clarity and certainty for entities seeking to obtain licenses from PROs.”
The inquiry is a response to the House Judiciary Committee’s letter to the Register of Copyrights, Shira Perlmutter, six months ago, which requested an examination of “concerns” and “emerging” issues in the PRO sector. The letter was signed by the committee’s chairmen, Rep. Jim Jordan and Rep. Darrell Issa, and member Rep. Scott Fitzgerald.
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“It is difficult to assess how efficiently PROs are distributing general licensing revenue based on publicly available data,” the letter read. “For example, it is difficult to determine how accurately lesser known and independent artists as well as smaller publishers are being compensated compared to widely popular artists and major publishers.”
The letter added: “Licensees [like bars, venues, restaurants and small businesses] have reported receiving demands for royalties from new entities claiming to represent songwriters… Licensees are concerned that the proliferation of PROs represents an ever-present danger of infringement allegations and potential litigation risk from new and unknown sources.”
The Copyright Office’s notice of inquiry addressed this so-called “proliferation” of PROs as well, noting that for decades, ASCAP, BMI and the smaller SESAC were the only PROs in the U.S. However, in the last dozen years, this market has doubled in size with the introduction of Global Music Rights (or “GMR”) in 2013, PRO Music Rights in 2018 and AllTrack in 2019.
Around the world, most other countries only have one PRO representing all local rights holders’ interests — many also handle mechanical (or reproduction) rights as well — making the U.S. an especially unique and complex market for licensees.
Written comments concerning these matters must be turned in to the Copyright Office by April 11. After that, there will be a “reply comment” period that has a submission deadline of May 7.
Ozzy Osbourne is facing a copyright lawsuit over alleged social media posts featuring unlicensed photos of a famous rock star: Ozzy Osbourne.
The case, filed Monday in Los Angeles federal court, claims the Black Sabbath frontman illegally posted multiple images — of himself – that were snapped by prolific rock photographer Neil Zlozower.
The photographer’s attorneys say Ozzy posted the images to his massive followings on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) without seeking permission or paying Zlozower a licensing fee.
“The accounts are key components of defendant’s popular and lucrative commercial enterprise,” the lawsuit says. “Defendant has over 12 million followers on [Facebook], and over 6 million followers on [Instagram], and over 5 million followers on [X] — all of which are monetized and provide significant financial benefits to defendant.”
A rep for Ozzy did not immediately return a request for comment on the allegations.
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While it might sound unfair to a celebrity, the copyrights to a photo are almost always retained by the person who took it. Simply appearing in an image does not give a celebrity co-ownership of it, nor does it give them a right to repost it for free. To understand why, read Billboard‘s explainer here.
Ozzy is hardly the first celebrity to get sued over that legal reality. Over the last few years, Miley Cyrus, Dua Lipa, Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Emily Ratajkowski, LeBron James, Katy Perry and others have faced copyright cases after they re-used photos of themselves snapped by someone else.
And in allegedly using photographs snapped by Zlozower, Ozzy picked the wrong guy to test. Since 2016, court records show the litigious photographer has filed nearly 60 copyright cases against a range of defendants over images of Elvis Costello, Guns N’ Roses, Mötley Crüe and more.
In Monday’s lawsuit, Zlozower’s attorneys say Ozzy used several different photos. Five are staged portraits of the rocker standing alongside Zakk Wylde, the lead guitarist for Osbourne’s backing band since 1987; another features Osbourne onstage embracing Randy Rhoads, who served as guitarist on Osbourne’s first two solo albums before dying suddenly in a 1982 plane crash.
Zlozower says his team reached out to Ozzy about the allegedly infringing social posts in June – and then again in August and September. But he says the star “failed to respond,” meaning he was “forced to seek judicial intervention for defendant’s infringing activity.”
A new federal report on artificial intelligence says that merely prompting a computer to write a song isn’t enough to secure a copyright on the resulting track — but that using AI as a “brainstorming tool” or to assist in a recording studio would be fair game.
In a long-awaited report issued Wednesday (Jan. 29), the U.S. Copyright Office reiterated the agency’s basic stance on legal protections for AI-generated works: That only human authors are eligible for copyrights, but that material created with the assistance of AI can qualify on a case-by-case basis.
Amid the surging growth of AI technology over the past two years, the question of copyright coverage for outputs has loomed large for the nascent industry, since works that aren’t protected by copyrights would be far harder for their creators to monetize.
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“Where that [human] creativity is expressed through the use of AI systems, it continues to enjoy protection,” said Shira Perlmutter, Register of Copyrights, in the report. “Extending protection to material whose expressive elements are determined by a machine, however, would undermine rather than further the constitutional goals of copyright.”
Simply using a written prompt to order an AI model to spit out an entire song or other work would fail that test, the Copyright Office said. The report directly quoted from a comment submitted by Universal Music Group, which likened that scenario to “someone who tells a musician friend to ‘write me a pretty love song in a major key’ and then falsely claims co-ownership.”
“Prompts alone do not provide sufficient human control to make users of an AI system the authors of the output,” the agency wrote. “Prompts essentially function as instructions that convey unprotectible ideas.”
But the agency also made clear that using AI to help create new works would not automatically void copyright protection — and that when AI “functions as an assistive tool” that helps a person express themselves, the final output would “in many circumstances” still be protected.
“There is an important distinction between using AI as a tool to assist in the creation of works and using AI as a stand-in for human creativity,” the Office wrote.
To make that point, the report cited specific examples that would likely be fair game, including Hollywood studios using AI-powered tech to “de-age” actors in movies. The report also said AI could be used as a “brainstorming tool,” quoting from a Recording Academy submission that said artists are currently using AI to “assist them in creating new music.”
“In these cases, the user appears to be prompting a generative AI system and referencing, but not incorporating, the output in the development of her own work of authorship,” the agency wrote. “Using AI in this way should not affect the copyrightability of the resulting human-authored work.”
Wednesday’s report, like previous statements from the Copyright Office on AI, offered broad guidance but avoided hard-and-fast rules. Songs and other works that use AI will require “case-by-case determinations,” the agency said, as to whether they “reflect sufficient human contribution” to merit copyright protection. The exact legal framework for deciding such cases was not laid out in the report.
The new study on copyrightability is the second of three studies the agency is conducting on AI. The first report, issued last year, recommended federal legislation banning the use of AI to create fake replicas of real people; bills that would do so are pending before Congress.
The final report, set for release at some point in the future, deals with the biggest AI legal question of all: whether AI companies break the law when they “train” their models on vast quantities of copyrighted works. That question — which could implicate trillions of dollars in damages and exert a profound effect on future AI development — is already the subject of widespread litigation.
The company that owns the copyrights to Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” is suing a Ford dealership near the rapper’s native Detroit for using the iconic track in TikTok videos that warned viewers they “only get one shot” to buy a special edition truck.
In a lawsuit filed on Monday (Jan. 27) in Michigan federal court, Eight Mile Style accuses LaFontaine Ford St. Clair — which owns several dealerships near Eminem’s hometown — of blasting the song in the social media videos even though “at no time” did it get a license to do so.
“This is an action for willful copyright infringement … against LaFontaine for its unauthorized use of the composition in online advertisements for one or more car dealerships in blatant disregard of the exclusive rights vested in Eight Mile,” the company’s attorneys write.
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The lawsuit says the videos, which allegedly appeared on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook in September and October, used “Lose Yourself” to boost a special Detroit Lions-themed Ford truck, telling viewers: “With only 800 produced, you only get one shot to own a Special Edition Detroit Lions 2024 PowerBoost Hybrid F-150.”
Social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram provide huge libraries of licensed music for users to easily add to their videos. But there’s a key exception: The songs can’t be used for commercial or promotional videos posted by brands. That kind of content requires a separate “synch” license, just like any conventional advertisement on TV.
That crucial distinction has led to numerous lawsuits in recent years. The restaurant chain Chili’s has been sued twice for using copyrighted songs in social videos, including once by the Beastie Boys over “Sabotage” and again by Universal Music Group for allegedly using more than 60 songs from Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber and many others. The hotel chain Marriott and more than a dozen NBA teams have also recently faced copyright lawsuits over the same thing.
In the current case, Eight Mile Style pointedly noted that it had previously approved car commercials involving “Lose Yourself” — something of a natural fit, given the song’s connections to the Motor City.
“The composition was licensed and featured in a two-minute Chrysler television commercial that aired during the 2011 Super Bowl,” Eight Mile’s lawyers write. “Chrysler generated millions of dollars of new and used automobile sales across the world from this use of the composition.”
But LaFontaine’s decision to use the song without approval “usurped Plaintiffs’ exclusive rights to determine when and under what terms the composition may be used for commercial endorsements and advertising,” the company’s lawyers write.