Michael Jordan filed a lawsuit against the Chinese sports company, Qiaodan Sports Company Ltd, for copyright infringement.
Qiaodan, Jordan’s Chinese name, brings in billions of Yuans in revenue each year selling sporting goods. Although the Chinese government is often accused of ignoring foreign intellectual property, there are laws protecting individual’s names and recent legal precedent of NBA stars winning copyright suits in China: Yao Ming won in December and Yi Jianlian in April of this past year.
Jordan issued a statement:
“It is deeply disappointing to see a company build a business off my Chinese name without my permission, use the number 23 and even attempt to use the names of my children,” Jordan said in a statement.
“This complaint is not about money. It’s about principle and protecting my name,” he added.
According to Reuters:
Jordan filed the case on Tuesday in a Chinese court.
NBA breakout star Jeremy Lin may face similar issues in China further down the road as a woman in the eastern province of Jiangsu has already registered his name, in Chinese characters, as a trademark, the Shanghai Daily newspaper reported on Wednesday.
Lin himself is applying for a trademark in the United States to the term “Linsanity”, which is widely used to describe his meteoric rise to fame, according to the United States Patent and Trademark Office website.
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