Sparty pulls a Dave Brandon re: use of logo
Apparently MSU has contacted a small high school in Northern Michigan and asked them to change their logo.
I can see why Sparty would be worried that their sports programs might be confused with those of a high school of 400 students.
https://www.mlive.com/expo/sports/erry-2018/10/a4cfd817aa5394/spartans-will-and-spartans-won.html
October 24th, 2018 at 3:27 PM ^
I think this qualifies as paying too much attention to Sparty matters.
October 24th, 2018 at 3:28 PM ^
Wisconsin did the same thing to Lapeer West around 10 years ago.
October 25th, 2018 at 7:19 AM ^
They trademarked the letter "W", *eird.
October 27th, 2018 at 2:41 AM ^
It was the decal font. West used the exact same style, only changing the colors.
October 24th, 2018 at 3:45 PM ^
What does Brandon have to do with this?
October 24th, 2018 at 4:55 PM ^
Brandon, Sparty and Fail are all one big circle of love
October 26th, 2018 at 12:12 PM ^
No; seriously -- Michigan has enforced its logos just as other universities have. Just ask Underground Printing. It began long before Brandon, and will continue long after Brandon. And I cannot recall a single incident in which Brandon was unreasonable in asserting trademark rights on behalf of the U.
October 24th, 2018 at 4:18 PM ^
My wife went to Stockbridge high school (in Stockbridge, MI) and they used the exact Spartan flight song as their fight song.
October 24th, 2018 at 4:46 PM ^
As the logo coordinator for my high school that I work at that opened in 1965 and thus alliteratively went with the Spartans, much to my chagrin for the last 25 years between student and employment, I have pushed very hard for all of our programs to avoid using the Michigan State helmet logo for the purposes of not getting sued. We finally came up with a unique logo that has the helmet that also renders into the shape of an S, which while completely useless in battle, looks very cool overall.
October 24th, 2018 at 8:32 PM ^
Go Chargers
October 24th, 2018 at 5:10 PM ^
Wait, you mean there’s a small high school in Northern Michigan that also has a logo with an imprint of Devin Bush’s cleats on the face?
That is pretty specific.. can’t say that I blame sparty here.
October 24th, 2018 at 5:12 PM ^
Suing them for about $800 million?
October 24th, 2018 at 5:18 PM ^
They're not the only school that does this. In order to protect the school's brand and intellectual property, they have to make sure it's not being used illegally. It sounds like they are being reasonable in cooperating with Pinconning to resolve the situation.
This is an old article that gives some background on what and why colleges have to do this. Interesting to note that Kansas State is apparently well-known for being liberal with licensing the Powercat logo to high schools that wish to use it, while others (like MSU) are way more strict about who they allow to borrow the logo. And I cannot bring up KSU's Powercat without saying that sideways it looks like a bird ventriloquist.
October 24th, 2018 at 5:23 PM ^
Are we going to send our legal team to the Blue Hens (U. of Delaware)?
October 24th, 2018 at 5:53 PM ^
They send a letter, and then nothing happens. Its a non-issue.
October 24th, 2018 at 6:05 PM ^
Lots of things we can mock MSU for. This sure doesn't seem like one of them
MSU director of licensing Samantha Stevens, in a written statement. "While we do not actively seek out possible cases of trademark infringement, we do have a process for addressing the issue when we become aware since the United States Patent and Trademark Office requires trademark holders to make efforts to protect their legal rights to marks or risk losing them.
Seems like any school in this position is almost forced to act to keep their trademark. Non issue
October 24th, 2018 at 7:03 PM ^
Notre Dame did this with my high school so they changed the color of the tie on the leprechaun and that worked enough. Also when I played JV football we played up at Pinconning and my coach tried to bet the chaingang guy a wheel of cheese that we got a first down.
October 24th, 2018 at 7:33 PM ^
Unless this is an alternative high school located in a locked facility for juvenile sex offenders, I would think it would only help MSU's image. If they rely only on themselves to maintain their brand, they're screwed.
October 24th, 2018 at 8:13 PM ^
My hometown high school in southeast Ohio (barely over 250 students) had to stop using the Toledo rocket logo this year, made a lot of people upset. couple students got together and literally just took some detail out and moved the blast stripe up to look like a wing. Toledo and lawyers said that was good enough for them. Funny thing is, when I played you couldn’t tell a difference if we would of stood by Toledo players in unis we copied them in every way imaginable from uniforms to our logo.
October 24th, 2018 at 8:38 PM ^
You would think MSU would be more concerned with the lawsuits over Nassaar and the $10,000 B1G fine from the pregame incident with UM to worry about this. But, maybe MSU see this as a way to help pay for the lawsuits and B1G fine. ;)
October 25th, 2018 at 11:10 AM ^
Probably for the best. Wouldn’t want Devin to come stomp on their field.
October 25th, 2018 at 8:06 PM ^
Pinconning has a winning program and a clean record when it comes to sexual assaults. Don’t you have bigger fish to fry Mork?