Bob Taylor shares his story on getting ILY handshape copyright
Last week I did a news story about a dispute between two deaf-owned businesses over jewelry consisting of the “ILY” handshape. One company, RoseBYANDER, sought to stop another company, 58 Creativity, from selling ILY earrings because they had a design patent for a pendant with an ILY design.
I found out that there is someone who had a piece of intellectual property rights with the ILY handshape way before any of this happened. Bob Taylor is a deaf artist who received a copyright for his “ILY” handshape drawing in 1974. I was able to conduct an interview with him and his wife, Kavita Pipalia.
Bob will explain the story behind creating and copyrighting his work in the early 70’s.
Bob Taylor: There was a lot of symbolism at the time such as “peace,” “Black Panthers,” and other things like surfers and their “hang loose” sign. I said to myself, where’s our deaf symbol? There was nothing. I asked around and there was nothing. So I pondered and thought of the ILY sign. When I shared the ILY sign, some hearing people would get the wrong idea and think it meant F U. They would get confused and not get the concept. So I went back to my desk and thought of how to connect it with love. I thought of using a red heart to help make it more clear. So I put the ILY in a red heart to bridge the gap between the hearing and deaf worlds.
[Image showing four pieces of jewelry with the ILY handshape designed by Bob Taylor]
Bob: Then someone advised me that I should get my design copyrighted and patented. I asked if there were any and there was nothing. So I contacted the US Patent, copyright, and trademark offices. There are three avenues I had to go through. It was tough, the patent was tough as well, and the copyright issue had a lot of uncertainty. I had to go through a debate before they realized it. Those people did not know sign language at all and were hesitant. They thought it meant F U but they were mistaken. Eventually, they approved. It took four years. Wow. The whole goal was, my personal goal was to not let hearing people take it from us. I want the ILY and heart artwork to stay for good, period.
Alex: Now they will share their reaction to the ILY patent controversy.
Kavita Pipalia: His first reaction was to say “That’s impossible!” That was the first thing he said, “Impossible!”
Bob: Well, the reason why I said “impossible” is because the person I talked to at the US Patent office told me that you can’t patent the phrase, “Hello.” You can’t patent that. You can’t patent “Hi.” You can’t patent “Bye.” It’s in the public domain. So “I love you,” you can’t do that either. I understood it at the time. Usually, patents had to do with engineering, blueprints, and things that you’ve never seen before. It’s to protect your idea. It was at that time. My biggest concern is with the patent. If it is true that they have it, I’m going to go back to the U.S. Patent office again and ask why they let them have it and not me?
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Alex: Bob said he is disheartened to see the dispute between the two companies over the ILY handshape.
Bob: It really saddens me when a person tries to find success with a business and tries to sell things at a low cost. That’s fine. The other party — what are they trying to prove? Trying to control things? We don’t need that at all. Do your thing, that’s fine. The other party can do their thing, and that’s fine. Will one take all the other’s customers? But the customers can’t afford the other products. Just let the person make things at a cheaper cost. When I was traveling, at that time I was the only one selling (ILY things), deaf people would tell me that they had an idea for an (ILY) design and asked me if they could create one. I told them, “Sure!” They thought they weren’t allowed to sell their design ideas. Like Deaf Pride — I told them, “Sure. Why not?” There are some deaf businesses that are still operating today. My hats off to them. I don’t tell them that they can’t do that or that they are wrong. I mean, the USA is so huge!
Alex: So we now know the Bob Taylor story. We see that he got a copyright for his ILY artwork in 1974 and that he’s already created ILY jewelry that somewhat looks similar to what RoseBYANDER is selling and claiming patent rights over. We also see that Bob and Kavita want to find out more about copyright and patent issues.
Previous story about ILY controversy: https://www.dailymoth.com/blog/controversy-over-earrings-with-ily-handshape