The colour magenta!

I was just informed that T-Mobile are in a legal fight against some Dutch brands on the use of the -otherwise ridiculous- colour Magenta, on which they claim to have the copyright. In plain words they claim the exclusive use of this colour, meaning that all you designers, graphical artists and painters out there should be very cautious in your choice of colouring or you may be in trouble.

As a subliminal form of protest -and after apologizing for any visual problems this may cause- I inform you that the background of the blog will remain ridiculously MAGENTA until the next post!

Having quite a few friends in the graphical arts business, I am aware of colours having been named after the "discoverer" of their particular wavelength. So I know there is a "pinish" green called Veronese, a dark red called "Tiziano" and I am very fond of "Klein blue". Until thirty minutes ago, I had a strong disdain for Magenta, but just the thought that I may soon no be able to use colour code #FF00FF suddenly puts me in the place of Eve in front of the forbidden fruit!

I am getting the urge to recite the most quoted phrase in this blog -that is "jokes aside"- but I cannot. Simply because I am now completely convinced that if there is something out there more ridiculous than the colour magenta, it must be without any doubt the laws of the market that allow some people to consider that they can put a copyright on a colour. I guess next Nike would like to patent curved lines, McDonalds will impose restrictions on the use of the capital "M" and RJ Reynolds Tobacco will claim exclusivity on representations of camels. Apart from the serious problems this is bound to inflict on painters specialized in desert landscapes, it may only mark the beginning of an era , when this blog would be highly expensive to maintain (given the combination of a Magenta background and 7 capital "M"s up to this point, not to mention the curvature implicit in Times New Roman).

I would therefore like your attention here. This blog is staying online just because of an inherent tenacity against ridiculous ideas put forward by extremely bored company lawyers, anxious to justify their incredibly high salaries. Support our cause and keep Magenta free!