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Colleges getting bitter about copycat logos

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by JackReacher, Oct 22, 2010.

  1. SoCalDude

    SoCalDude Active Member

    I wonder if this could ever work in reverse. My high school was founded in the 1890s, which was long before the Minnesota Vikings came into being.
     
  2. Next the Steelers will go after the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.
     
  3. franticscribe

    franticscribe Well-Known Member

    This isn't exactly new. Notre Dame has long been aggressive about protecting its trademark against high schools. I remember 15 years or so ago when they went after an Indianapolis-area Catholic high school that was using their logo.

    And while the universities do appear somewhat petty in this sort of thing, they absolutely have to protect their trademarks (this isn't a copyright issue) or they run the risk of losing them. If there are a dozen high schools using the University of Florida's marks without licensing, then when they haul some t-shirt maker into court for making unlicensed UF gear, his defense is going to be that they've given up their exclusivity claim in the mark precisely because they let all these high schools use it.
     
  4. spikechiquet

    spikechiquet Well-Known Member

    I always was told (by school officials nonetheless), that the logos had to have six different tweaks made to avoid a problem.
    So I have seen a high school team nicknamed Eagles use a mid-80s Philly helmet (the one with wings), but they didn't have as many feathers and some were shorter than the original logo to qualify.
    I've seen a team with a Tigers nickname use LSU's helmet, even a school that started with a G use the Green Bay Packers logo, but they stretched it out and added a few lines to make the G look a tad off.
    I never see a problem with this...but then again, maybe I'm just lazy.
     
  5. Cosmo

    Cosmo Well-Known Member

    Interesting story ... we have two schools in our area that would fall under this banner. One has a similar scheme to the UVa logo, one more or less uses Arizona's logo (though with a different color scheme). I've always found interesting how many high school bands steal college fight songs as their own. At least two in our area play "On Wisconsin" and a couple of others play Notre Dame's fight song.
     
  6. novelist_wannabe

    novelist_wannabe Well-Known Member

    you might be interested in this:

    http://www.eastpauldingfootball.com/

    Georgia got permission from the Packers to use the oval G, but UGA reversed it; the Georgia G is black on a white background. The Packers' G is white on a green background. I don't know if Grambling has permission or not -- I assume they do -- but they're using the same kind of G, too. A high school in Georgia that has the Packers' colors uses the same logo, but it's a green G on a white background.

    BTW, this is a story that every one of us could localize ...
     
  7. Rusty Shackleford

    Rusty Shackleford Active Member

    I always knew Michigan paid its players.
     
  8. BitterYoungMatador2

    BitterYoungMatador2 Well-Known Member

  9. Starman

    Starman Well-Known Member

    I'm sick and tired of this boo-hoo bullshit whenever it comes up.

    Any high school worthy of playing competitive sports should have somebody in the building (a talented student or even a teacher) capable of sitting down on a computer with MS Paint or Corel Draw or something for christ's sake (or even in the olden days an ink pen or a box of crayons), and coming up with some kind of usable ORIGINAL logo, not based on ANYBODY ELSE'S.

    And if they don't, they need to lock up the footballs and basketballs and put the student body to work on its graphic design skills.

    Oh by the way the same goes for fight songs. Every school should have a piano or Casio keyboard sitting around, it shouldn't be that hard to come up with a punchy 30-second ditty that includes the name of ole Handjob High.

    Any high school that can't come up with its own logo and fight song isn't worth a shit. Copying/poaching somebody else's reveals a complete lack of originality as well as a lack of confidence in your own creativity.
     
  10. Mizzougrad96

    Mizzougrad96 Active Member

    I think Florida finally found an opponent it could beat.
     
  11. Crash

    Crash Active Member

    Starman nailed it. Come up with something original.

    My high school didn't have a logo. Just a letter and a mascot. Of course, my high school opened five years before the Civil War began and began playing football in like 1913, so I think it was a tad ahead of the logo craze. Even when they changed the name of the school, they didn't switch the letter. Try explaining that one to everyone who asks why the hell the letter on your hats isn't even in the name of the school.
     
  12. Mark2010

    Mark2010 Active Member

    There are only so many logos and nicknames in the world to go around. Whether it's high school, pee-wee or whatever, someone is always copying someone.
     
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