Private investigator sent to man's house for modifying legally purchased handbag [video] | Hacker News Reader

Private investigator sent to man's house for modifying legally purchased handbag [video]

youtube.com

53 pointsbitcharmer35 comments

This video by the dude it happened to is, imo, more interesting than Rossmann: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDAg1aVnnH4

It has things happening, making it interesting. I dont get why people would sit and watch someone sit and talk

Lots of people listen to the soundtrack of YouTube videos while they do something else.

...this. I have 10 hours a week in the car commuting and since there is a lot of podcast on video now I split my time in half. Half podcasts and half youtube. Sometimes I have to watch sections at home or work with code or equations but all in all it works very well. Probably not a new habit for others but the last two years I have been pulling in a lot of youtube "talks".

I find youtube releases of D&D streaming sessions to be a good road trip background noise. It keeps me more engaged/awake than a podcast/audio book. It also helps that I'm super far behind on many D&D streamers so there are 50+ 3 hour long videos in my que sometimes for stories that stretch across multiple groups of players.

I like watching Louis Rossmann sit and talk. I watch his other content, respect him as a person, and share many of his opinions. So I enjoy his commentary.

He seems fine, but I don't think he is saying anything an average HN reader wouldn't already be aware of.

Louis Rossmann has a successful cult of personality.

His brand is the pinnacle of “righteously angry IT guy who suffers injustice” and a lot of people vibe with it.

Why am I getting the impression you're implying he's a villain here?

We can turn this around and ask "why make a video when you are just going to talk to the camera?" and part of the answer is "that's where the money is", as Willie Sutton apparently did not say.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willie_Sutton#%22Sutton's_law%...

Summary: a many buys old Louis Vuitton bags, cuts them up and makes wallets (without any LV logos or representation that these are a LV product). He also makes videos about doing this. LV responds by sending out a private investigator and accusing the man of counterfeiting. The last half of the video is essentially marketing the creator's third-party Apple repair business.

>The last half of the video is essentially marketing the creator's third-party Apple repair business.

Sorry just an aside. This is the funniest way to figure out its a Louis Rossman Video without checking the link first.

^genus: Ficus, SecretBoss, or CompetitionSpy?

I have been watching YouTube videos less since user hostile changes, and I think it is interesting to compare summary tools with human summaries.

https://kagi.com/summarizer/index.html?target_language=&summ...

> The video discusses a case where a man modified used Louis Vuitton handbags to create his own wallets, removing the Louis Vuitton logo and adding his own. Louis Vuitton accused him of counterfeiting and sent a private investigator to his home to issue a cease and desist order, prohibiting him from even showing others how to do this online. The video argues that the man had the right to repurpose the handbags he legally purchased, and that companies like Louis Vuitton are overstepping by trying to control how people use their own property. It draws parallels to the right to repair movement, stating that a person's ownership rights supersede a company's brand image concerns. The video also criticizes major tech companies like Apple for their own poor repair practices that can damage their brand image.

>The last half of the video is essentially marketing the creator's third-party Apple repair business.

This made me smile. That's like watching a lock-picking lawyer video about his side project and saying "and then for some reason he picks a lock at the end of the video".

Or a certain warvlogger who shares my first name. He puts his combat experience to use giving insight but it is so cringeworthy that he's always trying to hard sell some caffeinated gum. (Myself I think Singapore has it right about gum)

Give Sponsorblock a try :)

> Myself I think Singapore has it right about gum

Singapore has it right about very little. Extravagant punishment for the sake of deterrence is not justice.

First of all I absolutely believe that the crafter has (and should have) the right to do what he did.

That being said,

> without any LV logos or representation that these are a LV product

the LV logo is right there in the center of the product.

https://youtu.be/zDAg1aVnnH4?si=PjVRhwyMVl34akj2&t=646

Yeah, this was a confusing thing to me too, but apparently the logo making the pattern in the print is not the "logo" they are talking about. Yes, it is the logo printed on the leather, but LV products also have other markings using the logo that help identify it as an authentic LV product. There are other things like clasps, stitching, edge work, etc as well that identify authentic products. These are the things that have been removed as well as the stamped logo of this person's brand on it which quite clearly LV would never do. All of this is explained in the video linked elsewhere in this thread from the actual leather worker that the TFA video is glomming onto.

It sure looks like it's the Louis Vuitton logo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Louis_Vuitton_LV_log...

https://i.imgur.com/3vXfA1n.png

The LV logo is also displayed on clasps and whatnot, sure. But he's still selling a product that prominently displays the LV logo. His rationale seems to be that since repurposing fabric and leather is legal, it's also legal to build and sell products that clearly display the LV logo because it's printed on the repurposed fabric. I'm not sure whether this would actually hold up in court or not.

You're still confusing on what they are considering the logo by being the stamp of the brand claiming who made it. If anyone were to look at it and see the other logo clearly stamped on it, it would be obvious it was not an LV bag. Knock-offs use fake fabric but try to hide it be using the logo to make it look like it was an official LV bag while selling as if it was an LV bag. None of that is what this person is actually doing. There is no intent on scamming someone. This person clearly says this is something they made.

Sure, he's putting the Corter Leather logo on the product. But he's also using the trademarked LV logo. It's not as egregious as outright counterfeiting, where people build products trying to nearly exactly resemble a genuine LV product. But at the end of the day, he's still putting the LV logo front and center in the wallet. You don't automatically get to use another company's trademark just because you also put your own trademark on the product. Less egregious trademark infringement is still trademark infringement. Louis Vuitton was wrong to accuse him of counterfeiting, but they can accurately accuse him of trademark infringement.

It sounds like his rationale is that he's only repurposing the material on the cut-up LV bag, which makes prominently displaying the LV trademark legal. I'm pretty skeptical he'd prevail if this actually went to court.

Awful summary. There is very clearly a LV logo right in the middle of the wallet. LV is famous for their leather being absolutely covered with their logo, it’d be rather difficult to make anything that didn’t show it. (Unless you really were just wanting to repurpose the leather and used acetone to dissolve the coating. But that would not get you that sweet sweet youtube ad revenue – not to mention the revenue he’s getting for these fake LV items, which he would not be able to match with just “plain leather wallet”)

It’s really not a cut and dry case.

The repurposed leather from the old LV bags has the LV logo on it.

Totally tangental (and paraphrased):

> often I don't see negative qualities in myself until they are exhibited by another person, and it makes it easy for me to recognize that negative quality and never take part in it again

Quite the self-awareness and wisdom! I've seen people change and become better because of this exact effect.

Reminds of the quote:

> A smart person learns from their mistakes; a wise person learns from the mistakes of others

IANAL but using the LV logo and their recognizable pattern to sell your own wallet, especially given that they also sell wallets, is a pretty bad idea.

I don't believe the issue here is the repurposing of the bag but rather the commercial use of it by creating a "competing" product. The author states in their video [0]: "Louis Vuitton went undercover to buy one of my repurposed wallets [...]". If it was done as a challenge for YouTube or a unique piece for your personal collection, LV probably wouldn't have bat an eye.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDAg1aVnnH4

> using the LV logo and their recognizable pattern to sell your own wallet, especially given that they also sell wallets, is a pretty bad idea

Have you even watched the video?

The commenter linked to a specific timestamp in the video, so I'm not sure why you think that user didn't watch it. The logo is centered and clearly displayed wallet: https://imgur.com/a/K1wumKz

He's adding his own logo, but he's absolutely displaying the Louis Vuitton logo in a prominent fashion.

I wonder Louis Vuitton really wants to stop the practice of repurposing their handbags, or they are doing it for a Streisand effect? Were that lawyers or sales managers who decided to go after the man?

Most likely they see it as cheapening their brand.

Seeing a luxury product being cut up for parts makes people see it as a sum of those parts and not a handcrafted luxury product.

LV is financially interested in preventing anything that might cheapen the luxury LV brand.

The existence of non-luxury wallets made of leather stamped with the LV logos seems to be perceived by LV as cheapening the LV brand.

That makes me want to get as much cheap LV stuff as I can and modify it and resell it.

Can we start labeling [rossman] in the submission title

I've never heard of the guy and now I need to delete my youtube cookies to get rid of his worthless talking head videos in my suggestions. I encourage people to flag the OP post because it is just a retelling of a story that happened to someone else.

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