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Toy
company sues Beastie Boys over 'Girls' song
[November 27, 2013] SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A Northern California toy company is fighting for its right to parody a popular Beastie Boys song.
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Oakland-based GoldieBlox filed a lawsuit in
federal court seeking permission to continue using a spoof of
the rap song "Girls." The song was on the trio's first album, "Licensed to Ill,"
released in 1986. It sings of the desire for girls to "do the
dishes ... to do the laundry ... to clean up my room." The company's marketing video spoofing the song depicts young
girls singing about building spaceships and coding software. The
video has gone viral in recent weeks, and some 8 million people
have viewed it on YouTube. The spoof is attempting to sell the
company's GoldieBlox engineering toys aimed at girls. The company said it filed the lawsuit last week after the
Beastie Boys threatened their own legal action for copyright
infringement. "GoldieBlox created its parody video specifically to comment on
the Beastie Boys song, and to further the company's goal to
break down gender stereotypes and to encourage young girls to
engage in activities that challenge their intellect,
particularly in the fields of science, technology, engineering
and math," the company's lawsuit stated. On Monday, the two surviving band members — Adam Horovitz and
Michael Diamond — said in an open letter posted on their
publicist's website that they support the toy company's message
of empowering girls. But they have a blanket ban on using their
songs in advertisements. "As creative as it is, make no mistake, your video is an
advertisement that is designed to sell a product, and long ago,
we made a conscious decision not to permit our music and/or name
to be used in product ads," the band members said through their
publicist. "When we tried to simply ask how and why our song
'Girls' had been used in your ad without our permission, YOU
sued US." GoldieBlox is one of four companies named as finalists in a competition held by software maker Intuit to pay millions for a Super Bowl advertisement for the winner. The company's "Girls" video is not part of the competition. [Associated Press; PAUL ELIAS] Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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