The AT&T/NASCAR saga continues: NASCAR files response

We’re a few days late with this one — apologies. Earlier this week, AT&T filed their answer to NASCAR’s appeal of an injunction that allowed AT&T to rebrand the No. 31 Cingular car. NASCAR filed their response yesterday, and we have to admit, we’re feeling a little biased about the issue right now. We’ve made our opinion clear: we think AT&T is right. However, it seems that every bit of news we read on the topic has us thinking, “wow, that’s a pretty weak argument by NASCAR.” Is that a product of our bias, or a true assessment of how this case is going? There’s nothing we hate more than a poor analogy. Maybe that’s why we dislike NASCAR’s answer so much. Get this: their attorneys compared Cingular changing its logo to AT&T to Cingular changing its logo to the Playboy bunny. Come again?

“Imagine Cingular were acquired by Playboy, changed its trade-name to Playboy and ‘adopted’ the Playboy marks,” NASCAR’s attorneys write in their latest brief. “Cingular cannot seriously claim that it could force RCR to use the Playboy marks. Nor can Cingular seriously argue that NASCAR could be compelled to permit display of the Playboy brand.”

We assume that they would not permit the use of the Playboy bunny because it is deemed inappropriate (we disagree, but whatever). So you’re comparing a situation where a logo change is considered inappropriate to a situation where a logo change, well, isn’t. We honestly have no idea why they would choose this tack. We hate to go heavy on the block quotes, but this really needs to be said:

“More realistically, imagine if Cingular were acquired by Google. During some of the relevant period another race car owned by RCR was sponsored by a Google competitor, AOL. As in the RCR-Cingular Agreement, AOL had exclusive advertising rights for its category within RCR. “Under Cingular’s reading of [its] Cingular-RCR Agremment, it would be permitted to ‘adopt’ the Google brand and ‘place’ it on Car No. 31, thereby rendering RCR in violation of its other contractual undertakings – all without RCR’s express written consent.”

But this isn’t an intra-RCR case. RCR’s contract with each sponsor governs how exclusivity within the team works. However, this makes it even more clear that NASCAR does not have a contract with such language. To us, it sounds like a Chewbacca defense. [Scene Daily]]]>