
T-Mobile demand Lemonade to stop using the color magenta - Yuval_Halevi
https://thehustle.co/11052019-deutsche-telekom-lemonade-color-rights/
======
asperous
For some background, the reason these laws exist is to protect consumers from
counterfeiters. If someone produces jewelry in a clean baby blue box,
customers will start to expect that same level of quality, etc. They will be
ripped off if someone else uses the same packaging but a low quality product.

However many things have to be considered from the consumers perspective. Is
there likely confusion? Is one of the main things courts are supposed to
consider.

~~~
penagwin
Yeah I don't understand their reasoning here. If some cell service company
started using the colors of verizon/sprint/T-mobile I could see that as
confusing and potentially misleading.

But outside of their market, they should have no say on who uses that color.

~~~
techwizrd
From the article, there is overlap in their markets.

    
    
      To add even more color to the kerfuffle, Lemonade filed a motion yesterday with the European intellectual property office to loosen Deutsche’s legal vice-grip on the color, and has petitioned to remove DT’s color-rights on magenta in the insurance sector.
      
      The problem is, T-Mobile actually does offer insurance on services like cybersecurity and tech-gadget protection policies, which could add a touch of gray to the magenta dispute.

~~~
pitaj
Please don't quote with code blocks. It's painful to scroll horizontally,
especially for mobile users.

Without code blocks:

> To add even more color to the kerfuffle, Lemonade filed a motion yesterday
> with the European intellectual property office to loosen Deutsche’s legal
> vice-grip on the color, and has petitioned to remove DT’s color-rights on
> magenta in the insurance sector.

> The problem is, T-Mobile actually does offer insurance on services like
> cybersecurity and tech-gadget protection policies, which could add a touch
> of gray to the magenta dispute.

~~~
dickeytk
I know HN is super minimalistic but I’d love a way to indent quotes
considering how often we do it here

~~~
Wowfunhappy
I'm not against that but what is wrong with using a carrot? It works well.

~~~
dickeytk
It doesn’t indent

~~~
Wowfunhappy
Why is this a problem? Visually, it's very clear what is and is not a quote.

~~~
dickeytk
So that it’s more clear? and supports multiple paragraphs

Do you indent your code? Or are the curly braces enough?

~~~
Wowfunhappy
...clearly we're not going to agree on this. Yes, I indent code, but—while
I've never thought about this before—I actually think using carrots could work
equally well! I'd add one carrot per ident level to the start of every line.

Back to quotes, for multiple paragraphs, I just add a ">" to the start of each
paragraph.

~~~
quietbritishjim
I totally agree with you, but FYI they're called "carets". Much as I like the
idea of carrots in comments :-)

------
mendelk
For those curious, based on the CSS on their respective websites, they aren't
_exactly_ the same HEX color, just pretty similar.

(Lemonade is #ff0083, while T-Mobile is #e20074. Comparison here:
[https://www.colorcombos.com/combotester.html?color0=e20074&c...](https://www.colorcombos.com/combotester.html?color0=e20074&color1=ff0083))

~~~
ryanmercer
Is this really what companies worry about? An insurance (edit: ha, I thought
it was a beverage company until I read another comment) company is using a
_similar_ colour as our telecommunications company so let's get lawyers
involved?

~~~
reaperducer
Yes, they do.

Lots of companies trademark their brand colors. UPS has a particular shade of
brown.

There are others, including 3M, Barbie pink, the yellow of a Wiffle Ball bat,
and Cadbury purple.

~~~
mattlondon
Cadbury lost that courtcase though [https://inews.co.uk/news/consumer/cadbury-
purple-trademark-c...](https://inews.co.uk/news/consumer/cadbury-purple-
trademark-court-of-appeal-nestle-193906)

------
kuschku
This might seem like overreach, but is just a natural consequence of trademark
laws.

If you can trademark a name as simple as "apple", and if you can trademark an
icon as simple as 4 squares of identical size and shape next to another
(windows/microsoft), then it becomes quite obvious that colors are treated the
same.

In the end, trademark laws as a whole will have to be reformed, but this is
just a natural consequence of the current laws.

~~~
Yuval_Halevi
Well, there is a thing called colormark, But as far as I know, color marks
apply to companies from the same industry. T-Mobile and Lemonade are not in
the same industry therefore, Lemonade should be able to use Magenta.

~~~
Someone1234
They both sell insurance, so one could argue they are in the same industry.
Unless we're going to sub-divide insurance between Home/Car and Phone.

~~~
HenryBemis
>They both sell insurance..

Does anyone know whether T-Mobile sell THEIR insurance or they act as brokers
selling someone else's insurance (e.g. Allianz, AXA, etc.)?

I also wonder the % of revenue of T-Mobile from insurance Vs their other
business lines.

(I don't really wonder)

~~~
Someone1234
Most consumer insurance companies are selling upstream insurance. They buy
insurance wholesale, and then resell it making a cut and taking care of the
customer facing part.

T-Mobile does the same. So in that way they're no different than any other
type of consumer insurance company.

------
rvz
This ownership of color is just ridiculous.

By that logic, Google is literally using the Fuchsia color #FF00FF for Fuchsia
OS which is literally classed a Magenta as the web color!

T-Mobile, I dare you to sue Google.

~~~
dickeytk
And in that case you could argue that they’re in the same industry

~~~
seisvelas
The magenta industry or the smartphone industry?

~~~
excalibur
The surveillance industry

------
cgb223
I hate when I buy renters insurance only to find out it’s a national cellphone
carrier...

~~~
JadeNB
Not that it makes it much less silly, but the article mentions:

> The problem is, T-Mobile actually does offer insurance on services like
> cybersecurity and tech-gadget protection policies, which could add a touch
> of gray to the magenta dispute.

~~~
teh_klev
Slightly tangentially O2 (Telefonica) my mobile provider also sold my car
insurance (though underwritten by Ageas), they weren't even a consideration
until they popped up with a good deal on a comparison site.

------
TimTheTinker
This is incredibly ridiculous. If a _color_ can be owned by a trademark,
what’s to prevent a particular audio frequency being trademarked, or a
particular temperature, or a particular luminosity? What if my construction
company trademarked “8 meters” — could I go and sue everyone who builds
8-meter-high buildings from then on?

Good on Lemonade for fighting it. But something is really wrong with the world
when claims like Deutsche Telekom’s are taken seriously in the first place.

This is almost like the “illegal number” involved in decss years ago. Here’s
the color: #e20074

~~~
bityard
You sound surprised that it is possible to trademark a color. This has been
part of intellectual property law for quite some time:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colour_trade_mark](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colour_trade_mark)

I'm not saying I agree that colors should be trademarked, just that it's
fairly common practice.

~~~
ARandomerDude
The problem is it's too broad a claim. Trademarking a color is limited to (1)
a specific competitive space, and (2) when it is a distinctive identifier of
your brand (e.g., DeWalt's yellow and black scheme in the power tools
business).

T-Mobile is in the telecom business, and Lemonade is in the residential
insurance business. T-Mobile should not be trying to take-down a company that
is not in their competitive space for using the same color on their website.

I am not a lawyer, but I have dealt with this at work. This is not legal
advice.

~~~
mikepurvis
Related to tools and colours, SparkFun got in trouble a few years ago over
selling knockoff multimeters with the same colour scheme as the iconic Fluke
one: [https://www.sparkfun.com/news/1428](https://www.sparkfun.com/news/1428)

~~~
pvaldes
> Sparkfun: So we really only have two options, ship them back [the
> multimeters, to China] or have them destroyed.

I wonder if they would consider the idea of painting them in a different
colour...

~~~
mikepurvis
Given that they were destined to be sold for $15 a pop, and already assembled
ready to go, I very much doubt that this would have been economically
workable. Even sourcing a paint that would adhere to the plastic body of the
device would be a huge headache.

~~~
pvaldes
Could be sold for $17 also, people would understand it, and the other option
is to distroy the products and lose the entire investment or to give out the
product for free at your coast and maybe close the project for lack of funds.

------
ajna91
There needs to be some kind of association for shared defense against bullies.
Increase the cost of patent/IP trolling while reducing the risk of defending.

NATO for small-businesses and startups.

------
WillDaSilva
Modern trademark laws (and IP laws in general) are generally upsetting. It
seems like they exist primarily for the benefit of large established players.

Nevermind that owning the exclusive rights to use a particular colour in this
way is absurd.

~~~
ummonk
Honestly, I'm not sure the laws are the issue, but rather the cost of fighting
lawsuits in the courts.

------
soamv
They're not even using the same pink! So this isn't just a usual "trademarks
just work this way" thing, it's also a question of how much of the colorspace
a trademark can own.

The techcrunch article is a bit more informative --
[https://techcrunch.com/2019/11/04/lemonade-gets-a-
nastygram-...](https://techcrunch.com/2019/11/04/lemonade-gets-a-nastygram-
from-deutsche-telekom-over-its-use-of-magenta-says-it-will-fight/)

~~~
skykooler
I'm going to trademark the color blue. Now every silicon valley startup is
infringing.

~~~
tracker1
I bet if your company was named IBN and you used a similar font and shade of
blue to IBM's, you'd be hearing from their lawyers.

In this case, I don't think a typical consumer would see brand confusion,
which is really the benchmark for trademark enforcement usually.

------
knolax
Sounds like a fun math excercise:

For any trademark of color T(represented as a vector in RGB colorspace), the
chance that a brand using color C can be successfully sued is equal to
1-k*||T-C||, where k is lesser than 1 divided by the maximum distance between
any two points in RGB colorspace. Find the minimum number of trademarks needed
so that for any color the chance of successfully suing is greater than or
equal to P.

------
schuyler2d
Particularly ironic based on the history of the Beatles' "Apple Records"
(music) suing Apple, Inc (tech) around apple logos.

Here it's T-Mobile (tech) suing Lemonade (music) over a color.

~~~
atombender
Lemonade is an insurance company, not music.

------
onychomys
Although this is clearly ridiculous, it does seem a little odd that Lemonade
isn't using a bright shade of yellow.

~~~
alluro2
I was slightly irritated by the same - what's the logic behind such branding?
Imagine "Orange Mobile" using purple as their primary brand color...

------
codereflection
This reminds me of a similar case between SparkFun and Fluke from 2014 where
Fluke demanded that SparkFun stop selling their own multimeters which had the
same colors as the Fluke brand multimeters.

[https://www.sparkfun.com/news/1428](https://www.sparkfun.com/news/1428)

~~~
dheera
Plenty of yellow multimeters (not Fluke copies) made outside the USA where
nobody cares about their childish crayon hoarding. And people wonder why stuff
isn't made in USA anymore?

------
tln
This is worrisome, because they claiming a broad swath of the colorspace
around magenta. It's hard enough to get the exact right color, without
worrying that huge players will assert copyright.

FWIW I found this website useful when deciding on complementary colors; you
can see how other companies have solved combinations.

[https://brandpalettes.com/](https://brandpalettes.com/)

... and here's what they have for T-mobile (no listing for lemonade)

[https://brandpalettes.com/t-mobile-color-
codes/](https://brandpalettes.com/t-mobile-color-codes/)

------
code4tee
Unfortunately they have to do this if they don’t want to lose the trademark.
You can’t trademark something if it’s deemed to be of common use. Of course if
your trademark is a color then this can be quite difficult.

~~~
slenk
I am more amazed that they issued that patent in the first place.

 _edit_ \- sorry, mistake, I meant trademark. I didn't know that wording
mistakes were downvoted so harshly.

I am amazed they can even claim a trademark over magenta, is that better?

~~~
lotsofpulp
Trademarks are not patents.

------
0xdead
What's next? Sue Lemonade for using 'L', 'e', 'm' and 'o' alphabets because
they're also used in T-mobile's name?

------
jpmattia
Imagine the implications once you consider there are people who are color
blind (and you are all hereby on notice that I own the color CCCCCC.)

~~~
jddj
I think you'll find that colourblind people don't typically see the world in
grey scale.

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makecheck
Protections should only apply to things that add _something_ beyond basic
elements. For example, it might make sense to allow a particular _pairing_ of
colors to be attributed and protected, since that at least requires more
creativity than picking a single color.

This is like telling everyone that you now own the letter “D” so no one can
ever use that in a word again.

~~~
7952
The basic elements of colour that most people perceive is pretty limited. But
within just "pink" there are lots of different shades that have different
properties and need careful thought. I think there is something here more than
just the basic elements. But it is not always obvious or objectively
measurable.

------
Hamcha
Props to Lemonade for fighting the claim. I just hope EU/German laws are as
punishing as US ones when it comes to trademark abuse.

------
hateful
Unrelated to the post, but I'm reminded that the color in question (at least
as far as light goes) does not actually exist and is made up by our brains:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9dqJRyk0YM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9dqJRyk0YM)

------
Animats
There's a good overview of color trademarks here.[1]

[1] [https://www.colormatters.com/color-and-marketing/color-
brand...](https://www.colormatters.com/color-and-marketing/color-branding-
legal-rights)

------
inlined
This article led me down a Wikipedia trial until this interesting defense
against trademark infringement:

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_moron_in_a_hurry](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_moron_in_a_hurry)

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Grokify
Lyft also has a similar color as T-Mobile. Did T-Mobile make the same ask of
Lyft?

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parliament32
Both trademark and copyright laws need reforms, and fast. This is getting
ridiculous, they're not even in the same industry.

------
markstos
Worth reading just for the colorful puns.

------
Balanceinfinity
and pink insulation foam [https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-
courts/F2/774...](https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-
courts/F2/774/1116/10307/)

------
nsxwolf
Is this where minimalistic flat design eventually ends up? Trademarking
colors?

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newnewpdro
Cyan, Yellow, and Black called, they want their color back.

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helpPeople
TMobile I demand you stop calling your internet service UNLIMITED.

It's not, there's tons of fine print and multiple limits.

------
futhey
TLDR; Clickbait headline. This is a fairly common practice. T-Mobile has filed
and enforces a color mark, a type of trademark, as do many other corporations,
for a specific shade of pink known as RAL 4010. Not the entire magenta range.

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uuri8n
The “protect people from counterfeiters” argument is a laughable defense

This is supply side protectionism at its root

Release a proper spec and let people implement

These rules enable protection for a middle man who owns a logo but otherwise
produces none of the physical equipment or theory behind the functionality
itself

It’s exactly the sort of nonsense ownership we need less of

Make these CEO actually contribute literally not through popularity contests
and regulatory capture

------
thrower123
It's not unprecedented, by any means. John Deere has won cases against
companies using its trademarked green and yellow color scheme. Granted, that
was within the same industry.

[https://www.deere.com/en/our-company/news-and-
announcements/...](https://www.deere.com/en/our-company/news-and-
announcements/news-releases/2017/corporate/2017oct17-deere-wins-trademark-
lawsuit/)

~~~
cameldrv
Green and Yellow, on tractors, is quite a bit more narrow than Magenta, in any
industry.

