Blackpink is one of the most famous South Korean music groups today. With a successful World Tour that included 70 performances across multiple continents, Blackpink has firmly established its position on the global stage and in the hearts of the Vietnamese fan community, known as V-Blinks. To achieve their current success, Blackpink and many other music groups, including the production companies and trainers behind them, have paid close attention to intellectual property rights from the early stages of group formation.
Intellectual Property Tools Utilized by Blackpink
Intellectual property rights have played a significant role in Blackpink’s success. For a music group, copyright is perhaps the most common and widely recognized form of intellectual property. However, in addition to copyright, Blackpink’s success has also been contributed to by several other areas of intellectual property.
Trademark
YG Entertainment, a multi-national entertainment company based in South Korea, primarily manages talent, produces music, and handles the management of various artists. In addition to Blackpink, YG also manages artists such as Sechskies, Big Bang, Akdong Musician, Winner, and Treasure, as well as actors like Choi Ji-woo, Cha Seung-won, Lee Sung-kyung, Yoo In-na, Son Na-eun, and others.
With nearly 30 years of history, YG has produced many music talents that have temporarily ceased activities, such as Wheesung, Epik High, 1TYM, Gummy, Seven, Minzy, Park Bom, 2NE1, Nam Tae-hyun, Lee Jong-suk, Psy, Seungri, B.I, One, CL, Lee Hi, Jinusean, Sandara Park, iKON, and Kang Dong-won.
For Blackpink, YG has focused on protecting the trademark rights related to the products and services that the music group can provide or is currently active in. For example, regarding their trademark, YG proactively registered the name of the music group Blackpink as a trademark ‘BLACK PINK’ on December 29, 2016, and it was granted registration on April 10, 2018, with the USPTO for various types of products and services.
Notably, in the realm of trademarks, YG has devoted significant resources to register trademarks for the phrases “Manobal” and “Manobal Lalisa” because these are the real names of Lisa, one of the four Blackpink members, and she is also the member with the highest global appeal.
The Manobal Lalisa or Manobal brand is primarily used for fashion brands owned by Lisa, including clothing, jewelry, footwear, hand and arm accessories, head protection, and more.
Registering a trademark helps protect the intellectual property rights of the brand, preventing others from copying, using unlawfully, or counterfeiting the owner’s products. This helps maintain the brand’s exclusivity and reputation with customers.
Fashion brands often invest a significant amount of time, money, and effort into designing and developing their products. Trademark registration helps protect these investments from being copied or unlawfully exploited. In particular, trademark registration plays a crucial role in the fight against counterfeit products produced unlawfully, transported across borders, and sold on the market.
Copyright
Copyright protection for Blackpink’s songs, albums, and music products brings several important benefits.
Firstly, copyright helps ensure that their creative works are protected from unauthorized copying or improper use. This not only safeguards the exclusivity of their work but also ensures that Blackpink does not face abuse or infringement of their rights.
Secondly, copyright provides Blackpink with the right to control the use of their work on various platforms, including online streaming, downloads, live performances, and advertising. By maintaining copyright, the music group can negotiate contracts and agreements with different partners, creating a stable source of income and fostering a sustainable career.
Lastly, copyright plays a vital role in motivating ongoing creativity for Blackpink and YG. Knowing that their work is protected and respected, and capable of generating continuous income, provides them with a stronger incentive to continue producing new ideas, experimenting with music, and developing their art.
Copyright is indeed the backbone of every music group, including Blackpink. All of their songs have been registered for copyright from an early stage, and their presentations on broadcasting platforms such as YouTube, Spotify, Twitter, TikTok, etc., are closely protected by various parties, ensuring that no one else uploads copyright-infringing content from YG.
The objects protected by copyright, neighboring right which are essential for Blackpink, include songs and lyrics, music recordings, live performance videos, choreography, unique appearances of the four female singers, derivative works such as “Lửa Hận thù” song in Vietnam derived from the song “Flower” performed by Jisoo (with unclear information regarding licensing from YG to create this song), and more.
Licensing
Licensing is a crucial aspect of Blackpink’s career as it serves as a primary source of income for both Blackpink and YG. They license their IP rights to various parties for use in numerous collaborative ventures. Sometimes, the members actively participate in promotional campaigns and brand endorsements for partner companies.
Some notable collaborations featuring the famous image of Blackpink include Oreo x Blackpink, Starbucks x Blackpink, Selena Gomez x Blackpink, Dior x Jisoo, Celine x Lisa, Tiffany x Rosé, Calvin Klein x Jennie, and more.
In addition to these partnerships, the four members of Blackpink and YG also engage in various other forms of collaboration. The most common is promoting products on Instagram through fashion photos of the members. Each photo can earn the members hundreds of thousands of dollars, depending on the views, interactions, and influence.
However, the most stable source of income still comes from licensing activities, allowing partners to use their images for marketing and product promotion.
Copyright Dispute between Blackpink and YG?
Blackpink, with its four key members, has embarked on numerous global tours and garnered a massive global fan following. They have achieved remarkable milestones, such as their song “Ddu-du Ddu-du” becoming the first K-pop video by a Korean music group to surpass one billion views, with two billion views at present. Their music videos for “Kill This Love” (2019) and “How You Like That” (2020) both set records for the most-watched music videos within the first 24 hours of release, with “How You Like That” breaking three records and establishing two Guinness World Records.
Blackpink is the music artist with the most subscribers and the most-watched music channel on YouTube. They are also the most-followed and most-streamed female music group on Spotify, among many other achievements.
Given their success, many fans have questioned whether, beyond being beautiful, talented singers, and skilled dancers, the members of Blackpink have the potential to be creators. This raises questions about whether they contribute to the creation of their songs and choreography, or if these are primarily the work of external partners under YG’s direction. Currently, songwriting and composition credits often list YG or Teddy as the creators, without mentioning the four Blackpink members.
According to some fans’ research, Blackpink members do possess songwriting abilities. Jennie and Jisoo have previously mentioned contributing to the writing of the song “Stay.” Although this disclosure was unintentional and quickly amended, fans were quick to notice. Lisa also revealed in an interview that she wrote part of “Playing with Fire,” and Jennie was fully involved in producing “Solo.”
However, none of these songs credit the girls as authors or co-authors. This has been a consistent policy at YG, up until “Lovesick Girls,” which credited Jennie and Jisoo as two Blackpink members who wrote the lyrics along with eight others, with Jennie also participating in production.
Nevertheless, is this a temporary change? Could it be that YG previously prohibited YG artists from participating in the songwriting, composition, and production process, as speculated by many fans?
We may never know the full truth, but we can speculate that even if the members are indeed capable of writing or contributing to songs, it’s challenging to assume they are all-around geniuses who can create music in addition to their packed performance schedules.
On the other hand, even if they do have the ability to create some songs, YG might have rejected those songs because they didn’t fit the overall theme of Blackpink as a four-member group. While each Blackpink member may have their individual writing and singing styles, they may not completely align with the overarching concept of Blackpink. This is why, since their debut, nearly all of Blackpink’s songs have been composed by producer Teddy Park, as he has the knack for maintaining the bold, edgy, and cohesive image that defines Blackpink.
Almost all of Blackpink’s released songs have been written and produced primarily by Teddy, with a string of hits that helped make Blackpink a global sensation, including “Boombayah,” “Ddu-du Ddu-du,” “Kill This Love,” “How You Like That,” and “Pink Venom.”
Furthermore, another argument that largely dismisses the dispute over creative rights between YG and Blackpink is that YG has always had a reputation as a haven for artist-composers. Many artists trained by YG have been accomplished songwriters, such as members of Bigbang, 2NE1, iKON, Winner, and AKMU.
If YG were to ban songwriting, there’s a good chance they would set off a massive legal time bomb that could potentially explode in the future, destroying the decades of effort they’ve put into building their legacy.
Therefore, it’s highly unlikely that YG would decide to change its traditional legacy without allowing the talented Blackpink members to create their own work. We should accept the more probable truth that these talented individuals are not world-class composers in addition to their success through their singing and dancing abilities.
You can see a list of South Korea IP Firms here.