Who cares? It's my first amendment right to psychologically impact you by writing: "coca cola tastes like spiced oven sludge".

The fact that you can pay me to include your product in my media doesn't imply that it's illegal for me to mention your product otherwise.

But to follow up, why should we protect brands from negative psychological associations in movies?

We still allow real products to be used in satires, even though satires could have the same unconscious effects you reference. We still allow people to publicly criticize products. We still allow real public figures and events to be referenced in fictional media, even though the same psychological effects you reference could negatively impact people's perception of them as well.

I still don't see anything that's special about a trademark that means it needs extra protection in this area.

> We still allow real products to be used in satires, even though satires

The brand owners still get licensing fees whenever real brands are shown, in movies

I am not a lawyer, and I'd welcome input from a real lawyer. But I am almost certain that satirical references to real brands are protected by fair use. I similarly suspect that licensing is not a legal requirement for movies.

I would be curious how you square your claim with Rogers v Grimaldi[0], or more directly, how you square it with the outcome of the very case we're commenting on.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogers_v._Grimaldi

https://www.inta.org/TMR/Pages/vol99_no6_a2.aspx Pay attention to huge vulnerabilities like (6) the defendant’s intent in adopting the mark, wherein the defendant will have to show how a property was not used for a purpose, that the plaintiff will take issue with. Does anyone remember the Ford suit to stop news outlets from showing jihadists driving around in Ford pickups?

Rogers v Grimaldi is a narrow ruling in a district court about a celebrity name. It does not apply broadly to all branding and it's generally not worth a court battle to find out, since the filing is going to benefit the plaintiff.

That being said, there are consequences outside of pure legal issues to deal with in media production, which makes things like Apple's "allowance with their own restrictions" work. It's not a legal issue, but they can attack your post production just as well as making it a legal issue about filming.

>We still allow people to publicly criticize products.

Yes, but you're not allowed to harm people or businesses by knowingly making false statements about the product in your criticism. I would guess that a negative fictional portrayal of the product would run afoul of that. Satire often uses branding that is fake but similar enough to the real thing that it's obvious what it's meant to portray.

Hmm, I swear quite a few ads often attack rival brands by name, and make them out as significantly worse on questionable grounds. Like many console war era ads in the gaming industry, which were very happy to tear rivals to shreds over things that didn't match reality.

So it seems there are definitely ads that attack competitors or make false statements about their products, and they don't all get banned/spark lawsuits over it.

The plaintiff would have to show that they lost revenue as a result of the false statements, which I would think would be particularly difficult to do in that case, because portrayals made openly by a competitor are not as likely to harm the reputation of the company as are portrayals made by someone who does not obviously have anything to gain from the negative portrayal. But that's just a guess.