Rabble rabble rabble: copyrighting fashion.

Can I just say that I think all this talk lately of copyright infringement in fashion is totally ridiculous?

For those who don't follow fashion, basically what has happened is this: the Council of Fashion Designers of America, together with a handful of designers including Diane von Furstenburg and Zac Posen, are working to introduce legislation which would enable them to copyright their designs. From my very unscientific internet research, the specifics of the law, if passed, would be this: designers would be able to register their designs with the US Copyright Office, and they would be copyright protected for three years. Certain items, like jeans and tee shirts, would be considered to be in the public domain and would not qualify for protection. Infringement would cost the offender $250,000.

As someone who is relatively knowledgeable about copyright law, albeit primarily in the press and the music industry, I feel comfortable saying that these laws will never be passed, but the fact that Diane and the CFDA are even trying just smacks of elitism and, quite frankly, makes me sort of sad.

First and foremost, I think that someone needs to send Diane von Furstenburg a memo informing her that she did not invent the wrap dress. I mean, come on: what is a sari or a toga if not a wrap dress? I don't think that some sort of fashion angel came to her in a coke-fueled haze at Studio 54 in 1977 and inspired her to produce a completely new and innovative style of dress that wrapped around the body and tied at one side. I mean, anyone who's ever worn a towel around the house after getting out of the shower has invented a wrap dress. It isn't that I don't thoroughly enjoy her designs - I do, and my one DvF dress (which is, incidentally, not a wrap)is my go-to dress when I'm feeling a little alpha female - but they're not that groundbreaking.

The thing that really flummoxes me is how would you go about defining the standard of copyright infringement in a garment. You couldn't. It's insane. The language used in the proposal, I believe, is "strikingly similar." But what constitutes strikingly similar, and where do you draw the line? Certain decorative and finishing techniques are widely associated with certain designers, and when they're applied to a specific type of garment, there will be parallels whether intentional or not - are Proenza Schouler going to start going after anyone who uses trapunto stitching on corset tops? Will Marchesa try to copyright rosettes on cocktail dresses? How do you decide what counts as intellectual property, and what violates it? Is it like the threshold for obscenity: "I know it when I see it?"

And, do we really not have enough of a legal backlog in this country that we need to have judges examining how closely one pair of pants resemble another? Plus, most of the fashion industry is centered outside of this country. I haven't heard much about rumblings from Paris or Milan, but should we get the United Nations on the phone? I mean, the ICC has got Charles Lubanga in custody, so surely they've got a few minutes to devote to the plight of elitist fashion designers the world over! Shouldn't Nicolas Ghesquiere be making sure all those Palestinians don't try to reappropriate his keffiyeh for spring?

Not to mention, copyright law always has allowances for fair use. Fair use is a effective defense against copyright infringement if it can be proven (with other considerations, of course) that an alleged infringement is somehow transformative of the original rather than simply being derivative. It's a slippery slope logic-wise considering that any garment production is going to be for profit, which is a huge hindrance in a fair use, but I'd argue that in an industry that is entirely based upon transformation and evolution, there needs to be some reciprocity. If high-end designers are taking and expounding upon looks from the street, why shouldn't the resulting creations be able to trickle back down to the street? Not to mention, another key consideration in fair use is the effect of the use upon the original's market, and let's be realistic here: this isn't like file sharing in the music industry. The effect of a cheap knockoff on the market for an original designer piece is negligible at best.

People don't elect not to buy designer dresses because they'd prefer knockoffs. People choose not to buy them because they are retardedly expensive. The vast majority of consumers will never be able to afford a designer dress, or will never feel conscionable buying one. Most of the people who are buying knockoffs at H&M or Forever 21 would never even entertain the notion of walking into Saks and dropping four figures for a Zac Posen, no matter how lovely it might be. I certainly can't afford to be shopping on Net-a-Porter, but I also haven't been afflicted with a conscience when it comes to frivolous shopping and so I do anyway, and tend to live off Lean Cuisines and Campbell's Soup as a result. But not everyone is willing to forgo real food and staying out of credit card debt just to know that they've got a fancy labels sewn inside their dresses. And for every designer dress I own, I have two from Target or the mall. But I'm not the norm, and furthermore, I couldn't have nor would I want a closet exclusively full of labels. We're talking about two completely distinct markets, and really the only place that they overlap is among a relatively small cross-section of fashionista-types, like me, who might pick up knockoffs for the novelty factor or to mix in with nicer pieces.

I feel like a lot of designers support high/low mixing and if not knockoffs as such, a broader, less high-end-centric approach to dressing. So to see some designers taking this stance is highly disheartening. And, social considerations aside, it seems to me that taking such a cyclical industry and restricting the flow of ideas to just one direction can only be detrimental in the long run.

But what do I know? My shoes are just BCBG knockoffs of Louis Vuitton. (Sorry, Marc. I still love you.)