Celebrity brand-dilution lawsuits can backfire into free publicity

Evidence

At the time Hon offered his free advice, brand dilution was making headlines because Nike had announced it was suing Lil Nas X and the art collective MSCHF for that very violation. Without the sports giant’s approval, the marketing-savvy artists had taken 666 pairs of Nike Air Max 97 running shoes, inserted drops of human blood into their soles, renamed the sneakers “Satan Shoes,” and sold them for $1,018 a pair. It was all part of the promotional rollout for Lil Nas’s blockbuster single “Montero (Call Me by Your Name),” whose video featured the singer giving a lap dance to the devil. Nike claimed that Satan Shoes were “likely to cause confusion and dilution” for its brand, since consumers would assume the altered sneakers had something to do with the company. The lawsuit played directly into Lil Nas’s hands by generating a boatload of free publicity, and Nike quickly settled. (As I type this, I am realizing that this is a terrible analogy for my situation: it casts me as a giant litigious multinational and Other Naomi as Lil Nas X, who is a genius.) — Naomi Klein, Doppelganger, 152

Categorization

• CANDY: The Satan Shoes story — blood-filled Nike sneakers sold for $1,018 — is a perfect odd dinner-party fact.
• XREF: The title ‘Call Me by Your Name’ doubles Klein’s chapter title ‘Call Me by Her Name’ — a deliberately baiting riff Klein is punning on; connects to her own book’s title.