The Beastie Boys vs. GoldieBlox Lawsuit Ruined the Best Commercial of 2013 Posted by Nathan S. on 11/25/13 | Filed under Opinion, Debates, Beastie Boys

I have a three-year-old daughter and believe me, every day is a struggle against the Princess syndrome. It doesn't take long before you realize just how determined the world is to put a young girls in a princess box. Strangers say things like, "She's beautiful, she's going to be a real heartbreaker," which might seem like a compliment, but is already defining her worth in relation to beauty and men and is actually a pretty fucked up thing to say to a toddler. She comes home from preschool asking for a Sleeping Beauty doll because she saw it on another girls' backpack at school. Even well-intentioned family members give her tutus as susprise gifts. 

Having a princess as a role model isn't inherently a terrible thing, it's having a princess as a girls' only role model that's a terrible thing. So that's why when I saw this GoldieBlox commercial floating around the interwebs I was stoked. I literally watched daughter watch it three times, and then we built some "machines" out of cardboard and tape in the house and I was feeling good. I had my daughter excited to build things, and as bonus points, the rap nerd in me was stoked to hear the Beastie Boys' let their "Girls" hit be flipped into an anti-princess anthem. Fuck yeah GoldieBlox, fuck yeah Beastie Boys, and fuck yeah girl engineers. Hooray world, you finally did something good. 

How naive of me. It turns out that the Beastie Boys hadn't given permission for the song to be used and had at least vaguely threatened GoldieBlox with a lawsuit, GoldieBlox responded by pre-emptively suing the Beastie Boys and WHY DO YOU PEOPLE HAVE TO RUIN EVERYTHING THAT'S GOOD AND DECENT?!?!?

Ok, let me rewind. A quick recap of the facts (as we know them). When MCA died he stated in his will that he didn't want any Beastie Boys song used for any commercial purposes, at all, ever, under any circumstances, and it appears that Mike D and Ad-Rock have held true to his wishes, actively shutting down any commercial use of the group's music. GoldieBlox did not reach out ahead of time about "Girls", so the Beasties' lawyers contacted them and, while they didn't file a lawsuit, made it pretty clear that they would. GoldieBlox responded by suing back, arguing fair use; in short, they're saying the song is more of a parody than a sample, and they therefore have a right to use it without permission as free speech. (See more on fair use in my article about RapGenius.)  

To which the Beastie Boys responded: 

Like many of the millions of people who have seen your toy commercial “GoldieBlox, Rube Goldberg & the Beastie Boys,” we were very impressed by the creativity and the message behind your ad.

We strongly support empowering young girls, breaking down gender stereotypes and igniting a passion for technology and engineering.

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.

So who's right? Sweet baby jesus, who knows? On one hand I get where the Beasties are coming from. While MCA's will doesn't hold any legal weight how could I possibly not support the man's non-commercial wishes, and ultimately, even if they are doing social good, GoldieBlox is a business that's selling products thanks to a hit video featuring (essentially) a Beastie Boys song. 

On the other hand, by flipping the lyrics GoldieBlox did so something more creative and original than just use "Girls", so maybe it is fair use. And I do geniunely believe in their cause. Maybe it's fucked up of the Beastie Boys to send the lawyers after them. Although maybe it's fucked up of GoldieBlox to not reach out ahead of time. Although the entire point of "fair use" is that you don't have to obtain permission from people likely to block your exercise of fair use. 

Really I don't know which side I'm on, but the fact that there are now sides is the real shame. In the span of about 48 hours this went from one of the more purely feel good stories of 2013, to me calling lawyer friends to ask if this was "fair use" and wishing I didn't work in music journalism so there wasn't a part of my brain trying to figure out the implication of this court case on copyright law and music publishing in the digital age. 

So thanks for ruining this for me everyone involved. I won't even say what you should have done because that would involve sorting out who's right and who's wrong, and I don't know who's right or wrong. All I know is I still would rather have my daughter be an engineer than a princess, and I'll do everything I can to steer her away from the music business. The music business is where all good things go to die.  

UPDATE: GoldieBlox Pulls Beastie Boys Song From 'Princess Machine' Viral Video