Virgin America Sues Blogger Over Fake US Airways Hudson Ad

[Matt Molnar]

http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/2009/01/custom_1233176615266_Picture_1_10.png
Virgin America has filed a lawsuit (http://adweek.blogs.com/adfreak/2009/01/virgin-sues-adrants-for-posting-a-parody-ad.html) against the AdRants advertising blog for publishing the above parody ad, which is of unknown origin.

Of course had they not sued, we probably never would have seen this, nor would have millions of other people.

[T-Bird76]

My firend sent me that picture and it was captioned, "The difference between First Class and Coach." If you look at the picture it does make you laugh, lol

[cancidas]

it does make you laugh, and maybe this is thier way of getting paid instead of paying for advertising.

[Planesntrains]

Well, unless they pay-off the jury the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on this in '86. Falwell v. Hustler. The court ruled in favor of Hustler Corporation, stating in their summary that use of likenesses, logos, and statements can be used without permission or license in instances of parody/satire.

Just more proof that some people need a sense of humor. :roll:

[PhilDernerJr]

I think that since many people did not see the joke photo, Virgin America was able to sue, get attention, and since they will 1) get free advertising, and 2) let people know that they were not behind the "tasteless" photo, they come out on top, and will probably drop the lawsuit.

[Tom_Turner]

In the UK recently, Elton John lost a similar suit against The Guardian.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/dec/1 ... l-guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/dec/13/law-press-and-publishing-elton-john-libel-guardian)

Similar in the sense of some not acknowledging satire or irony or perhaps, simply humor.

I believe one of the deciding factors was if "reasonable" people would miss the joke or not.

Of course with Virgin, some might think for half a moment this did come from them. But I do think Phil's probably right, and Virgin picked an advantageous approach - get rid of it ultimately, clear any slim chance of misunderstanding, all the while gaining maximum publicity and spreading the content as an unambiguous joke.

Tom