After GoldieBlox, a toy company, created a video about female empowerment set to a lyrically altered version of Beastie Boy’s “Girls,” the company took a preventative action in suing the band in November. GoldieBlox claimed that including the song in their video fell under “fair use.”
The Beastie Boys then responded in an open letter, saying: “As creative as it is, make no mistake, your video is an advertisement that is designed to sell a product, and long ago, we made a conscious decision not to permit our music and/or name to be used in product ads. When we tried to simply ask how and why our song ‘Girls’ had been used in your ad without our permission, YOU sued US.”
GoldieBlox quickly removed the video and wrote an open letter of its own, claiming, in part: “Our hearts sank last week when your lawyers called us with threats that we took very seriously. As a small company, we had no choice but to stand up for ourselves. We did so sincerely hoping we could come to a peaceful settlement with you.
However, it seems that didn’t satisfy the Beastie Boys as they have now filed a lawsuit of their own. The lawsuit claims copyright infringement and states, “GoldieBlox has engaged in the systematic infringement of intellectual property from numerous popular music groups, including Beastie Boys.” Among that list of music groups, the lawsuit makes mention of Queen, Daft Punk, Kaskade, Avicii, and more.