According to Variety, HBO sent Jake Paul's gambling app a cease-and-desist over a three-minute commercial reuniting Jeremy Piven and Adrian Grenier, in which Piven makes his way through a mansion party to pitch a movie to Grenier on a yacht. Betr declined to take the ad down and answered the letter with its own letter.
The ad, per Variety, has no character names, no show footage, no lifted dialogue. Just the exact vibe of two men who spent eleven years being allowed to be that on HBO, now doing it for a betting app. The show's own creator called it a "cheap, shitty imitation" that "makes me puke." A gambling app has produced the most loyal fan the show ever had, and the fan has receipts.
The receipts are the fun part. HBO's letter claims everything about the spot, "from its setting, to the actors' clothing, dialogue, and manner of speech, is evocative" of Entourage. Betr's response: "HBO owns 'Entourage.' It does not own Jeremy Piven and Adrian Grenier." Then it dug up the case law. When HBO sued to protect "Ballers" and "Six Feet Under," it won by telling the courts that Miami parties, celebrity lifestyles, and fast-talking characters belong to everyone. As Betr puts it, "What HBO called stock as a defendant it calls 'creative expression' as a plaintiff." The machine that built a case on these things belonging to everyone now claims them as private property, and a betting app is holding its own old argument back at it.
The mechanism is the cease-and-desist as press release. Nobody is taking the ad down. The lawsuit is the marketing.
YOUR TURN: If Miami parties and yachts belong to everyone, who exactly does the yacht belong to?
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