Harvard Licensing holds up FCC shirts

University | 10:01 p.m. | Nov. 14, 2011 | By Natasha Thondavadi

The original t-shirt design. Photo by Facebook.

The game is in six days. So why haven’t you seen any eager freshmen already sporting their official FCC game shirt?

After submitting the shirt design to the Dean’s office and the Yale licensing office, the FCC was asked to consult with Harvard Licensing, said Nathan Kohrman ’15, chair of the Freshman College Council. This was the first time the FCC was asked to cross enemy lines during pre-game prep, he added.

But this was no mere formality. Harvard “had a problem with our use of their name,” Kohrman explained, and so did not allow the FCC to use their name.

“After a week of us navigating the licensing bureaucracy to little avail,” Kohrman said, “Harvard ultimately told us that they in fact took issue with our use of celebrity names in conjunction with their name.”

The shirt originally featured Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates "liking" a Facebook post about dropping out of Harvard. According to a Facebook page, a modified version of the shirt will go on sale tomorrow at 8 p.m. The new version replaces Gates and Zuckerberg with a sentence reading "people who like this also like Social Networks, Personal Computers and Roads Not Taken."

It’s not the first time controversies have surrounded the FCC’s design. In 2009, the LGBT Co-op protested the shirts’ use of the word “sissies,” calling it a “thinly veiled gay slur.”

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COMMENTS

Dynasty 6 months, 2 weeks ago

It's a parody! You don't need their permission to make fun of them! Just print the shirt.

theAvenger 6 months, 2 weeks ago

PRINT THE SHIRT

JE14 6 months, 2 weeks ago

I agree with the two previous comments. Who gives a s---? Those shirts are still awesome.

anon12 6 months, 2 weeks ago

Yeah what? There is absolutely no way that you legally need their permission to print the shirt.

CrazyBus 6 months, 2 weeks ago

Parody is fair use, you don't need their permission!

River_Tam 6 months, 2 weeks ago

If they don't print this shirt, the FCC is a bunch of sissies.

yale_senior 6 months, 2 weeks ago

I mean I think the issue is not actually Harvard so much as its the Yale Administration making sure that all the legal i's are dotted before the FCC can take a fart. The FCC should just get a residential college to print the t-shirt's and avoid the bean counters in the Dean's office.