It’s like a game of Russian roulette.
I walk up the creaky wooden steps of the small two-room establishment with no expectations. Upon entering, I’m greeted with a mix of familiar smiles and beady-eyed, judgmental stares.
I grab a newspaper, take a seat and begin listening to the ongoing discussion as I wait for my turn. I have arrived at my local barbershop, and I’m about to get a haircut.
Sometimes the haircut is decent. Sometimes I find myself wearing a baseball cap for two weeks. There’s really no telling how the haircut is going to turn out after I say, “cut it like usual.”
I’m perfectly fine with this lack of consistency because I don’t go there for the haircut. I go there for the lively debates.
My barber and his patrons are an older crowd that love to discuss a wide range of topics that include everything from the local rumor mill to politics and sports. It’s one of the most entertaining environments I’ve ever seen, and the atmosphere is worth every penny regardless of the haircut I receive.
If you’ve ever witnessed elderly men come to blows about the different ways to smoke a pig, you’d probably agree with me.
Barbershop discussions are not specific to my hometown though. In fact, one could argue that barbershop debates are a ubiquitous occurrence in American culture, and various movies and television shows have used barbershops as a setting for such conversation.
However, just like Al Gore claims to have invented the internet, Lebron James has recently claimed intellectual property rights on the barbershop discussion.
James and his media company UNINTERRUPTED recently sent Nick Saban and the University of Alabama a notice of copyright infringement because Saban’s new web series “Shop Talk” is too similar to James’ web series “The Shop.”
A James versus Saban battle is a matchup sports fans never knew they wanted, so I’d like to send a big thank you to the United States judicial system for making that possible.
Unfortunately for fans of James, there’s not much of a case to be made in his favor.
There is nothing proprietary about James’ web series to be protected by copyright laws. Interview-based television shows are a dime a dozen, and as I’ve already mentioned, barbershop banter is ingrained in American culture.
Movies like “Coming to America” and “Barbershop” are famous for their barbershop scenes and the television classic “The Andy Griffith Show” used Floyd’s barbershop as a hub for social activity in the town of Mayberry.
Without getting too technical, a barbershop would fall under the scènes à faire distinction in legal jargon. This means that common settings and cultural references are important to society and should not be included in the scope of copyright protection.
Many interpret the scènes à faire principle to include places like coffee shops, park benches and barbershops.
Some might argue that the execution of the web series as well as the logo and title of Saban’s show are too similar to James’, but it appears that the law leans in Saban’s favor once again.
James’ “The Shop” and Saban’s “Shop Talk” both utilize scissors in the logo, but it’s a barbershop for crying out loud. What sort of logo would you expect from a show based out of an industry that cuts hair?
As far as the title goes, Alabama has since renamed the show “Bama Cuts” as a possible path to appeasing James and ending this dispute despite the fact that the university could have probably left the original name without facing legal repercussions.
Winning a trademark claim would require proof that a typical consumer would have trouble distinguishing one show from the other, but that’s unlikely since the shows are in different barber shops, the logos are similar but noticeably different and James and Saban aren’t exactly mirror images of one another.
There’s no doubt the 6-foot-8 James could dunk on the 5-foot-6 Saban on a basketball court, but most legal analysts would agree Saban has the edge in a legal court.