Have Hotpots fallen foul of the Olympic bosses?

A county folk band has suffered its own Olympic disqualification.
The Lancashire HotpotsThe Lancashire Hotpots
The Lancashire Hotpots

As well as dealing with doping scandals and worry over Paralympic funding, the International Olympics Committee (IOC) has been scrutinising the 2008 song The Beer Olympics, by The Lancashire Hotpots.

Members of the band say they have been issued a ‘cease and desist’ notice by the IOC, claiming they have infringed copyright on the Olympic name.

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A statement released on the band’s website said: “It’s nice to see them finally catch up with a song that we first released in 2008, I’m guessing the Olympic breakfast at the Little Chef is next, get one while you can.

“So, not wishing to get into any massive legal trouble (we can’t pay for that and the ale) we have decided to re-title the song to see if that gets the legal bigwigs off our backs.”

The new title has been announced as The Beer International Non-Profit Non-Governmental Sporting Quad Yearly Event.

“It’s a strange thing that they’re coming after an entity as small and daft as ours,” said Dickie Ticker the percussionist who wrote the song.

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“Under something called Article 40, it seems that you can’t use the word Olympics in any business capacity. People would probably use a lot of words to describe our band, but business wouldn’t be one of them.”

He added: “The re-titling has made the song funnier than it was and I hope it’s enough to put them off.

“But we still sing the word in the song, so are we going to have to change that too? We’re testing the waters to see if that pleases the Olympic Gods, but if not, we’ll have to erase it from our catalogues.”

The IOC issued a statement saying it was the exclusive owner of the rights to the Olympic Games and associated symbols and emblems.

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It said: “The IOC is particularly attentive to the protection of its intellectual properties rights and assets. As such, the IOC asks that all non-authorized uses of the Olympic Properties, in particular, for commercial purposes, be ceased accordingly.”

In 2012, The British Sugarcraft Guild was told it could face court proceedings if Olympic logos were reproduced on cakes at a show.

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