The estate of the late musical artist Prince has filed a claim to trademark a particular shade of the colour purple, according to ABC News. If the estate succeeds, producers of films and music could be banned from using that colour without permission.
Prince’s company, Paisley Park Enterprises Inc., filed a trademark application for “Love Symbol #2,” which the company Pantone and the Prince estate created in memory of the singer. Love Symbol #2 was meant to be the “official colour across the brand he left behind,” according to Pantone’s statement.
Prince, known sometimes as “The Purple One,” often wore the colour purple, and his most famous song was Purple Rain. He was also planning on touring with a piano that was the same shade as Love Symbol #2 before he died.
You can’t patent a colour, but it is possible to trademark it for certain uses. For example, if you started selling jewellery in Tiffany blue boxes, you would be in trouble; that’s why the colour “Tiffany Blue” isn’t listed in pantone guides. To win a lawsuit against someone using that colour on their boxes, Tiffany would have to argue that they were using the colour to try to create confusion in the marketplace.
If the estate wins the trademark, it doesn’t mean that no one could use that particular shade of purple for any purpose. It would only mean that, without permission from the trademark holder, no one could use it for film and musical performances in a way that leads the audience to associate them with Prince.
Prince and his estate are famously protective of their copyrighted material. In 2016, Universal Music even filed a DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) takedown notice on a video of people singing the song “Purple Rain.” A large group of people in Minneapolis were singing the song as tribute to the late singer just after his death.
