It seems there's a new story about online copyright infringement on the Internet every day, but the fashion industry shows that intellectual property law is not the only way to engage in innovation
and generate growth. Brand names and logos are protected by trademark, but the design of clothing is generally not protected in the United States.
Two law professors recently wrote a paper
that outlines how the industry manages to function without much intellectual property protection because of two interacting factors: "induced obsolescence" and "anchoring."
The first means
that clothes become unfashionable before they wear out, so trendy people have to keep buying new clothes every year. But how do the fashionable decide what the next big thing is? The industry
"anchors" the consumers in this season's fashions by copying each other's designs. If all the designers are showing baby-doll dresses in spring 2006, there's a good chance that is what everybody will
be wearing by the summer of 2006.
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