This past weekend I was in New York City for the College Media Advisers conference. Not many of the sessions were of interest to me, a lowly Associate Copy Editor, but I enjoyed the opportunity to stay in the Marriott Marquis in the heart of Times Square.

The keynote speaker was Valerie Plame Wilson, the exposed CIA spy. While I’m not sure whether her presentation was completely relevant to the conference, it was gripping nonetheless. She regaled us with stories of her spy training, on par with the stories woven by Chuck Barris. (After the presentation I met her and tried to test her CIA-honed lying skills, but she declined.)

Mo Rocca was also to make an appearance, but never showed up.

Copywhat Infringement?

During the keynote presentation, I couldn’t help but notice the conference’s Big Apple-themed logo projected onto the screens to the podium’s sides (right image):

So apparently doing a horizontal reflection and changing the stem of another logo is enough to call something your own. The conference brings in dozens of student and professional designers, and the best they can do is knock off Apple’s logo, thinking no one will notice? This is made worse by the fact that there were at least two sessions on copyright laws!

This entry was posted Friday, March 21st, 2008 at 8:12 pm and is filed under Academia. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.