According to the New York Post, Eminem and his music publishing company has filed a lawsuit against German car company Audi AG for illegal usage of the Detroit native’s worldwide smash hit ‘Lose Yourself.’The luxury car dealer placed the song in the ad campaign for its new Audi A6 Avant, which was unveiled at an Audi Press event in Berlin last week. The company Eight Mile Style LLC filed a cease and desist order against Audi AG in Hamburg Regional Court earlier this week, and will be seeking further damages for the unauthorized usage of the song. It is said that the clip from Audi appears to resemble the commercial from Chrysler which also features the same song. I just have one question for Audi. Do you actually think no one would notice and did you think you would get away with this? C’mon son, really?…that commercial is in heavy rotation right now…so hilarious!
Joel Martin, principal of Eight Mile Style, told The Post, “No one has approached us for a license. I still can’t believe it. There is something strange about it. The Chrysler commercial is known all around the world and had 12 million [hits] on YouTube and for Audi or the agency to come up with this spot, I can’t figure it out. We believe Audi not only used ‘Lose Yourself’ to sell their product without permission, but their spot actually feels inspired by elements of Chrysler’s commercial campaign.” My thoughts exactly!
Anyway, although the lawsuit only involves the copyright infringement claim, it looks like Chrysler will also sue Audi, as the Detroit company has already legally reprimanded another company over its Eminem-featured Chrysler 200 campaign , which has been credited with boosting net revenues by 35 percent. Hmm, maybe I should just go ahead and remove “Imported from Detroit” from the bio portion on my twitter account…nah!
Watch the Chrysler 200 campaign featuring Eminem here :
Now watch Audi’s rip off version of the commercial for their new A6 Avant here:
I’ll let you be the judge *raises eyebrow*…
