An iconic shirt Frank Ocean wore in concert has sold thousands for an independent shop, but the idea for it was stolen
"Why be racist, sexist, homophobic or transphobic when you could just be quiet?" Ocean's plain-white shirt read, in capitalized black lettering.
As The New York Times reports, the shirt was produced by Green Box Shop, an independent online shop founded in 2016 by 18-year-old Kayla Robinson.
Over the weekend following Ocean's performance, the shirt became a viral hit on Twitter, and Robinson's site flooded with 5,500 overall purchases - a massive boon compared to her typical two-day sales of 100 orders.
The Times story goes on to detail, however, that the text of the shirt originated from the following August 2015 tweet, written by 18-year-old Brandon Male:
Male said he contacted Green Box Shop about the shirt earlier this year, and they initially disregarded him. After the shirt blew up following Ocean's performance, Robinson reportedly sent Male $100 via Venmo - less than 1% of the revenue gained from the $18.99 shirts in two days.
"It was an impulsive decision," Robinson told the Times. "I hadn't looked at the number of sales, and I wasn't thinking about it portionwise. It does look like I was just throwing money at him to keep him quiet."
Male could have filed a cease-and-desist against Green Box for using his tweet without his permission. Instead, the two parties have since agreed to avoid the nebulous waters of internet copyright protection by sitting down to negotiate a proportional profit for both sides.