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Chinese clothing brand sues Apple for stealing its logo for the App Store

Chinese clothing brand sues Apple for stealing its logo for the App Store

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Image: Kon

Apple is being sued for its App Store logo by a Chinese clothing brand called Kon that has a similar logo, reports Phone Radar. Kon, according to China’s Wikipedia equivalent Baidu Baike, is a clothing brand founded in 2009 based on the Sex Pistols’ Anarchy In The UK. The triangle is supposed to be skeleton bones that symbolize power over death.

Apple changed its App Store logo back in August from a paintbrush, pencil, and a ruler, to three sticks with rounded ends that overlap each other to form a triangle. Kon’s logo looks similar, but the ends are sharp rectangles.

See:

Image: Kon
Image: Apple App Store

The Chinese clothing brand says it owns the trademark to its logo and Apple’s new App Store logo used on iPhones and macOS is a violation of Chinese copyright law. Kon is demanding Apple publicly apologize and pay damages.

The Beijing People’s Court has accepted the case, according to Phone Radar. However, since Chinese courts don’t upload every case seen, the Kon case is not currently listed on the court website. Phone Radar expects that the judgment can come in over the next few weeks. Apple has dealt with a lot of lawsuits over this past year against the likes of Qualcomm, Samsung, and Corephotonics. Last year, it lost the trademark for the word “iPhone” to a Chinese vendor of leather goods.

We’ve reached out to Apple and Kon for comment and will update when we hear back.

Update December 19th 1PM EST: This article was updated to reflect that Kon claims it owns the trademark not copyright to its logo.