Can you sue someone for copying your aesthetic?

Plus, a foldable iPhone, swagged-out Zuck, Cybertruck culture wars, and Erewhon’s dirty secret

A lifestyle TikToker is suing another lifestyle TikToker for copying her ‘aesthetic’

Two fashion and lifestyle influencers are locked in a contentious court battle that could set a major legal precedent for protecting creators' online content.

TikTok content creator Sydney Nicole Gifford, 24, is claiming that another TikToker, Alyssa Sheil, 21, copied her “neutral, beige and cream aesthetic”, used the same fonts and camera angles as her, decorated her apartment like her, got a similar haircut, and featured similar Amazon products on her social media pages, a recent lawsuit alleges.

Gifford claims that Sheil basically copied her entire online vibe after the two initially met up to shoot photos and discuss a potential collaboration. After the meeting, Sheil allegedly blocked Gifford on TikTok and Instagram and began posting content that matched Gifford’s look and feel, sometimes posting content that was almost identical to hers. (You can scroll through the full complaint here for side by side comparisons.)

Gifford reported Sheil to Meta, TikTok, and Amazon, for copyright infringement and sent her a cease-and-desist letter. In April, she filed a lawsuit under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which protects copyright holders from online theft. Gifford copyrighted each video on her social media pages so that she could prove ownership of her original content.

Now, Gifford is seeking up to $150,000 in damages for "mental anguish” and lost income. She’s also seeking to have Sheil’s content taken down. Gifford argues that Sheil “infringed upon her ‘trade dress,’ which is the overall look and feel that distinguishes a specific brand from others,” Bloomberg Law, reported.

I think this case will be interesting to watch. I doubt Gifford will win (a “neutral, beige and cream aesthetic” is hardly unique!). But, if she does, it could have lasting ramifications on how influencers protect their content. DMCA takedown notices are the bane of every creator’s existence. But, most creators only receive them if they’ve directly used someone else’s content (such as a hit pop song or movie clip) without permission. Copying someone’s aesthetic seems like a much lower bar.

Creators copy each others ideas and videos all the time. However, big creators seem to be getting increasingly annoyed with the practice. Top YouTuber MrBeast recently spoke about dealing with copycats in an interview with YouTuber Jon Youshaei, saying that other creators had tried to copy his viral hotel video by visiting the same exact hotels, and even replicating his exact language, cadence, text overlays, and video editing style.

Still, similarities are inevitable online, where niche fashion trends can spread like wildfire and multiple influencers are often contracted to paid to promote the same products. If "wearing a beige set with cowboy boots and a flower clip” in your day in the life TikTok becomes legally protected, I fear half of Brooklyn will end up indicted.

And as the famous saying goes, “good artists borrow, great artists steal.”

What I’m reading

Apple moves forward with foldable iPhone

Apple’s first foldable iPhone could arrive as soon as 2026. Finally Gen Z might learn the most satisfying way to end a call, slamming your phone shut! - The Verge

The first ever Esports Olympics will be held next year

The International Olympic Committee has approved the creation of the Olympic Esports Games. The inaugural Olympic Esports Games are slated to take place next year in Saudi Arabia. - HuffPost

The real reason Erewhon is a cult brand

This deep dive on Erewhon’s success and business model was very interesting. “The specialty grocer is famous for its wellness fare—but that’s really just a decoy for its fairly conventional prepared foods.” - Bloomberg

Why don’t straight men read novels?

In 2023, women made up 80% of the book-buying market and accounted for 65% all fiction purchases. “This idea of the hyper-capitalist man with no time for something as ‘pointless’ as reading began to take root in the Victorian era. In the 19th century, reading novels developed a reputation as a frivolous and feminized activity.” - Dazed

Elon Musk backs down from $45 million a month pledge to Trump, says he doesn’t ‘subscribe to cult of personality’

Musk says he’s not spending $45 million a month to elect Trump, but he has created a new super political action committee to fund the Republican candidate called the America PAC. - Fortune

My 28,000-follower Twitter account was hacked—and it changed my life for the better

The writer Jared Keller describes spending nearly 15 years growing an audience on Twitter only to lose it in an instant. “Social media is designed to get you to post—and being a chronic poster sucks.” - Fast Company

Meet One of the Most Prolific People on Yelp

What inspires someone to write more than 1,200 Yelp reviews in a year? Robert Siu, a former industrial engineer has won two Yelpies (Yelp’s equivalent to a Pulitzer) and genuinely believes in the program as a way of encouraging honest criticism. - Eater

The quiet rise of Nick Pickles: X CEO Linda Yaccarino’s Right Hand Man

“Pickles, a former music photographer, has risen to become one of the most prominent executives at X, charged with fighting Elon Musk’s growing number of political battles over the social media platform while fending off global regulators.” - Financial Times

Are you being exploited by AI-powered surveillance pricing?

The FTC is investigating surveillance pricing, an increasingly common practice that allows companies to offer the exact same product to different people at different prices based on the device they’re shopping on, their location, demographic info, credit history, browsing history, etc. I hate it! - The Verge

Researchers detect deepfakes with the same tools used to survey galaxies

The Royal Astronomical Society has proposed a new way of identifying AI-generated deep fakes by analyzing human eyes in the same way that astronomers study pictures of galaxies. - The Next Web

Why is everyone rawdogging?

Over the last few months, the slang term, once used to refer to sex without a condom, has been adopted to describe literally any activity accomplished without the assistance of a buffer. - New York Times

Jake Paul’s W body care brand raises $11 million to compete with Axe, Old Spice

W, the personal body care brand co-founded YouTube star and boxer Jake Paul, just raised a nearly $11 million Series A, which values W at more than $150 million, according to executives. W launched exclusively at Walmart last month but will expand to other retailers soon. - WSJ

How a car dealer’s surprisingly funny parody of “The Office” blew up on TikTok

A small car dealership in upstate New York hired 23-year-old Grace Kerber to up its social media game. Her video series "The Dealership"—an homage to "The Office"—went viral on TikTok and put the local business on a global map. Now, Hollywood is calling. - Forbes

A newly swagged-out Mark Zuckerberg is dragging the rest of Meta into his makeover era

Meta is looking to buy a 5% stake in Supreme's new parent company and people close to the deal say the eyewear group is aiming to launch a new version of Supreme smart sunglasses in partnership with Meta, to better target young consumers. - Sherwood

How Frank Lloyd Wright became a household name for Gen Zers

After decades of making reproductions and museum-shop fodder, the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation started partnering with hip designers and brands including Kith and New Balance. The partnerships have made the foundation relevant to a younger, more diverse audience, and between 2016 and 2023, the foundation nearly doubled its yearly royalty income. - Fast Company

Lego introduces its Fortnite collaboration

The new Fortnite lego sets include a 954-piece Battle Bus kit for $100, a brick-based replica of the iconic Fortnite hot-air balloon on wheels, complete with a removable roof and characters. The Lego sets are available for preorder now and will ship in October. - LEGO

You can now drive Tesla’s Cybertruck in Fortnite

Speaking of Fortnite collabs, “Epic Games is expanding its range of crossovers in a new partnership with Tesla. Starting this week, players can drive the electric car company’s iconic Cybertruck in both Fortnite and Rocket League.” - Venture Beat

NYT calls the Cybertruck ‘a culture war on wheels’

Speaking of cybertrucks, “Consumers have long expressed their personalities and lifestyles through their cars — think of the midlife crisis Corvette. But there has not been an automobile — or any consumer product, really — that has provoked such strong reactions, that has carried so much loaded cultural meaning.” - New York Times

How a Cafe in Thailand Unintentionally Hijacked the TikTok Algorithm

A random Thai cafe is dominating the #ceasefire hashtag on TikTok. The captions on 28 of Highway Cafe’s last 30 posts include the hashtag #ceasefire, which is heavily associated with the Israel-Gaza War. According to TikTok’s Creator Center, out of the 125,000+ videos using #ceasefire in the last year, 15 of the top 20 most-viewed videos were posted by Highway Cafe. - Silence Brand

YouTube Music Critic Anthony Fantano Is Hiring Breaking News Writers

Anthony Fantano, YouTube’s biggest music critic, is hiring writers for his website, The Needle Drop. Instead of a traditional salary, he’s paying writers a “percentage of revenue generated from their articles” and writers will get bonuses subscription revenue. Writers have to write two articles a month to qualify. - Garbage Day

Facebook turned off the news in Canada. What happened next?

The number of people using Facebook and Instagram in Canada hasn’t budged, but for news organizations, the impact has been more dramatic. 6 months after the blackout, Canadian news outlets had lost 64% of their engagement and local outlets had lost 85%. Almost half of local news outlets had stopped posting on Facebook, gutting the visibility of local news content. - Mint

Other fun stuff

Katie Notopoulos at Business Insider tried the Swype vape phone that's going viral. It’s a vape that’s also a cell phone and you can tweet from it.

This poorly executed Kurt Cobain A.I. deepfake with heavy accent livestreaming on TikTok and talking about how much he loves his iPhone in heaven is strangely captivating.

The food ordering app Toast has created the darkest dark pattern.

The humans vs whales war is heating up again. There is now an angry humpback whale patrolling the waters of Portsmouth New Hampshire and it capsized a ship.

Button Stealer is a Chrome extension that automatically “steals” a button from every website you open. Do your usual everyday online stuff and watch the collection of your stolen buttons grow. It's fun, useless, and free!

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