Rainbow Friends Creators Sue Over Alleged Trademark, Copyright Infringement

Defendants Abdoulaye Niang, Alexander Niang, Mewza LLC, Abarika LLC and Henan Fanding Network Technology fraudulently claim they are original creators of the Rainbow Friends video game characters “Purple” and “Green,” alleged a trademark infringement suit Wednesday (docket 1:24-cv-01913) in U.S. District Court for Southern New York in Manhattan.

Plaintiffs Bryan Fletcher, of Alabama, and Garrett Fletcher, of Tennessee, created Rainbow Friends in 2021. The online video game experience became a “global phenomenon” on Roblox, said the complaint. Rainbow Friends eclipsed 1 billion plays “within months of going live,” the complaint said, and gamers from 180 countries play the game daily, it added. The Niang defendants' actions with respect to intellectual property violate Roblox copyright and trademark rules, the complaint alleged.

Authorized Rainbow Friends products are available for purchase, including a line of plush toys and clothing featuring Rainbow Friends “monsters” Blue, Purple, Green, Orange, and the Scientist, the complaint said. The plaintiffs own U.S. Copyright Registration No. PA 2-377-605, issued Oct. 31, 2022, covering layout, design and materials the game uses in connection with Rainbow Friends products, including the Blue, Purple, Green, Orange, and Scientist characters, it said.

Federal courts upheld the validity of the Fletchers’ copyrights in seven cases, holding that they are owners of “valid and enforceable Rainbow Friends copyrighted designs,” the complaint said, citing Fletcher et al v. The Partnerships and Unincorporated Associations. The plaintiffs own “all right, title and interest in and to the Rainbow Friends Copyright and Copyrighted Material, which constitute original and copyrightable subject matter under the U.S. Copyright Act,” the complaint said. That includes exclusive rights to reproduce, prepare derivative works of, distribute copies of, and display Rainbow Friends copyrighted material to the public, it said.

The trademark for Rainbow Friends “was so widely used that it has also acquired distinctiveness, and has developed a strong secondary meaning among consumers and the trade, such that consumers immediately identify Plaintiffs as the exclusive source of the products bearing the Mark, signifying goodwill of incalculable value,” said the complaint.

The Niang defendants acknowledge they became Rainbow Friends fans soon after the game launched and then created “morphs” and “mods” of the copyrighted works, said the complaint. Their actions, however, “completely contradict those of a true fan,” it said, because defendant Alexander Niang created “infringing, derivative works and then through an I.P. address styling himself as ‘Bootleg Blari' extorted Plaintiffs to buy their own 'Purple’ character,” it said.

The Niang defendants obtained copyright registrations for Purple and Green based on “material misrepresentations and omissions of fact,” said the complaint. Copyright registration for Purple doesn’t disclose that the work is “derivative” and based on existing characters “in a copyrighted game” and doesn’t identify the copyright registration the Fletchers hold for Rainbow Friends and the game’s underlying characters, it said.

The defendants’ copyright application didn’t include the Purple character’s “pre-existing physical characteristics” from the game, including facial features, fingers, teeth and color, it said. The copyright registrations for the Niangs' Green and Purple characters identifies them as “unpublished works” as of March 2023, which plaintiffs assert are “material misrepresentations,” citing their published versions of Purple in July and August 2022.

The Niang defendants have a pending trademark application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for the word mark MEWZA, with the first date of use as Dec. 30, 2017, said the complaint. The specimen used "is an image of a plush toy which is an infringing product” of the Fletchers’ Purple, and a “clear misrepresentation and fraud" on the USPTO, the complaint said. The defendants didn’t create their own version of the Purple character until August 2022, it said.

The defendants have also posted their “infringing” videos and artwork on YouTube and Twitter and are facilitating sales of their “unauthorized products” through Amazon and eBay, operating under seller aliases “so that they appear to unknowing consumers to be authorized online retailers of the authentic Rainbow Friends products,” the complaint said. Upon information and belief, the Niang defendants have sold infringing products on WorthPoint, eBay, Amazon, and Walmart, “as the products are identical to the ones in the specimen" that the defendants provided in their trademark application, it said.

The Fanding defendant “deliberately designed, manufactured, imported, advertised” and sold, “without authorization or license” from the plaintiffs, infringing products bearing the infringing mark and using designs and materials that are “identical, substantially similar and indistinguishable from, and confusingly similar to Rainbow Friends Intellectual Property,” alleged the complaint. Fanding’s internet store has content and images that “make it very difficult for consumers to ascertain that these are infringing, unauthorized products,” it said.

The plaintiffs' claims for relief include false designation of origin, trademark dilution by blurring and by tarnishment under the Lanham Act, copyright infringement, violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, deceptive acts and practices under New York General Business Law, unjust enrichment and constructive trust. The plaintiffs seek orders temporarily, preliminarily, and permanently enjoining the defendants from using the Rainbow Friends trademark or any reproductions in any manner in connection with the distribution, marketing or sale of a product that’s not an authorized Rainbow Friends product.

The plaintiffs also seek an order that any financial institutions or services “identify and restrain” all funds up to and including the total amount of judgment used in connection with the defendant sellers’ IDs “to be surrendered” to them “in partial satisfaction of the monetary judgment entered.” They seek damages and defendants’ profits, believed to be over $500,000, or maximum statutory damages of $150,000 per work infringed. They also seek actual, punitive and compensatory damages, plus attorneys’ fees and costs.