Stealing Our Way To A T-Shirt
It turns out it's really hard for a small team of public radio employees to turn themselves into a cutting-edge apparel company.
This insight may be obvious to you, but it took us a while to figure it out.
Back in May, we announced on the podcast that we'd be making a Planet Money t-shirt. Then we got swamped in the details.
This week, though, we're back with two podcasts on the t-shirt project.
Today, we look at the economics of design. And we explain why ripping off other people's fashion ideas is a good — and, for the moment, perfectly legal — strategy for us to pursue.
For more:
* On today's show, we talk to Kal Raustiala, of UCLA Law School. Read his paper on the odd way intellectual property works in the fashion industry.
* We also talk to Johanna Blakley, an expert on pop culture and fashion. Here's her Ted Talk, "Lessons from Fashion's Free Culture."
* And we discuss a bill that would limit copying of fashion designs. Here's the text of the bill, and here's a fashion industry association's take on the bill.
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