Muso's Protest Against Taylor Swift's 'This Sick Beat' Trademark Is Metal As

The dichotomous Taylor Swift struck again last week, generating a not-insignificant amount of scorn for filing to trademark words that people use all the time but also just happened to appear among the lyrics for last year's acclaimed full-length LP 1989.

Among other potential new acquisitions such as " 'cause we never go out of style^TM", "nice to meet you, where you been?TM" and "party like it's 1989TM", Swift has filed to trademark the not-exactly-unique phrase "this sick beatTM", presumably to make way for an official line of sweet merch — probably pencil cases and deodorant, that sort of thing — emblazoned with fully endorsed T-Swift branding.

Understandably, not everyone has taken kindly to Swift having filed these applications, with US-based writer, musician and artist Ben Norton releasing a protest song under his metal-centric project moniker Peculate that takes a brazen jab at Swift's attempted trademark through not just using the words "this sick beat" in his song, This Sick BeatTM, but only using the words "this sick beat".

As though the aural middle finger above wasn't enough of a statement, Norton has released a lengthy missive describing his thoughts on the socially damaging nature of Swift's trademarking, and beyond, highlighting that his protest is not actually against the Shake It Off scribe herself but the "systemic policies that allow wealthy individuals and powerful financial entities to privatise language that is collectively owned and then to profit off it".

" 'This Sick Beat™' is directed at a system, not mere individuals," Norton wrote. "Swift is simply a member of the economic elite that has the money and resources to do so. Her trademarking these phrases is symptomatic of larger systemic issues, not her personal behaviour."

"Language is common property," he continued. "It is part of the commons. Trademarking 'this sick beat' or 'I’m lovin’ it' is not unlike a corporation profiting off of any other form of common property, such as land, natural resources, water, air, and more."

"The subtleties of intellectual property rights constitute an incredibly complex subject that I do not have to space to adequately address in a short statement, but I want to make it clear that there is a crucial difference between trademarking proper nouns you yourself coined and idioms that are of collective origin," Norton wrote.

The full statement is available at the artist's website; we highly recommend you take the time to read it (or most of it; it is pretty long and words are hard work), as it's an incredibly considered, informative and well-thought-out statement of intent to complement his provocative track.