RZA Files Multi-Million Dollar Lawsuit Against Wu-Tang Clan Bootleggers

RZA is the de facto  leader of the hip hop group Wu-Tang Clan. He created a backronym for “RZA”, stating that the name stood for “Ruler, Zig-Zag-Zig, Allah” which further translated into “Ruler, Knowledge-Wisdom-Understanding, Allah.” He is also not one to let someone play with his money.

According to AllHipHop, RZA is suing a number of bootleggers for selling products with the Wu-Tang Clan emblem. The lawsuit claims that e-commerce stores used the iconic Hip Hop group’s trademarks to make things appear legitimate, resulting in trademark infringement, counterfeiting, and false designation of origin.

Defendants are thought to be operating out of China or other countries where trademark protection is inadequate. The effort intends to prevent bootleggers from selling additional Wu-Tang Clan products, as well as counterfeit copies and colorable imitations, by urging companies like Amazon, eBay, and AliExpress to delete adverts.

Many defendants also deceive unknowing consumers by using the Wu-Tang Clan Trademarks without authorization within the content, text, and/or meta tags of their e-commerce stores to attract various search engines crawling the Internet looking for e-commerce stores relevant to consumer searches for Wu-Tang Clan products.

Advertising

Advertising

Other e-commerce stores operating under the Seller Aliases omit using the Wu-Tang Clan Trademarks in the item title to evade enforcement efforts while using strategic item titles and descriptions that will trigger their listings when consumers are searching for Wu-Tang Clan products.

RZA is suing for all earnings and damages for trademark infringement, as well as $2 million in damages for “every usage” of the Wu-Tang Clan trademarks. In 2017, RZA filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against Woof-Tang Clan, a Brooklyn dog-walking firm.

Wu-Tang Clan’s name and emblem had been “unmistakably associated” with the group since 1993, according to court documents, and the company’s attempt to trademark its name was a violation of copyright.

What’s your take on this story? Sound off in the comments!