January 2008 Cover
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By
Dawn Ivory
According to Adult Video News, Toyota has threatened legal action against EboysStudio.com, a Geneva (Switzerland) gay porn business, unless it ceases vending or promoting one of its stars by the name of Lexus. Toyota
claims that use of the Lexus name, trademarked for its luxury automobile line, violates U.S. law and "tarnishes" the car manufacturer's reputation.
Porn performer Lexus is, according to Eboys's owner and chief executive officer Daniel Grangier, one of the company's most popular stars, appearing in such crowd pleasers as
SpunkLand and CumEaters.
A
t first, AVN reports, Grangier was amused at Toyota's demand, but after a chat with the auto giant's attorneys, Grangier admits, "I'm not laughing anymore."
Grangier avers it is absurd for Toyota to be able to trademark the name of a Greek god, the source, he contends, for the porn star's moniker. (Dawn has had trouble, though, finding any online citation for such a God,
except at Wikipedia's discussion of the luxury car's etymology.) Dawn maintains it's absurd to think anyone would confuse a cum-hungry Swiss hottie with a two-ton Japanese car that can park itself.
This is not the first time Toyota has sued to protect the Lexus name. In 2004, they sent a letter to photographer Suze Randall demanding she stop using images of Lexus Locklear, star of
Debbie Does Dallas: The Next Generation.
While Grangier says he's not sure how his company will respond, Dawn has a word of advice for the overly litigious folks at Toyota: stop fighting a good thing! Surely a few focus groups would reveal that associating any
product with an alluring youth able to win his photo on the box of a DVD titled
SpunkLand only results in increased consumer interest.
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