Thailand goes gaga over Lady Gaga's trademark gaff

IP Komodo reported here on what should have been an amusing but minor Twitter snafu by Lady Gaga during her recent concert trip when she mentioned the availability of fake watches in Bangkok.

A media frenzy followed, with Thais and foreigners arguing on both sides. Thailand's Commerce Ministry said she is undermining its efforts to stamp out piracy. "Lady Gaga is a representative of the US and the US puts pressure on smaller countries to promote the protection of intellectual property," one official supposedly said. They cited Lady Gaga's dependence on her own IP. Now the Thai Intellectual Property Department announced it was writing to the US Embassy in Bangkok, to complain that an 'ambassador' of US culture would tweet such a thing.

IP Komodo's favorite quote in the Bangkok Post "So let's get this straight. The very office that has failed miserably in getting all those fake Rolexes off the Bangkok streets is protesting about somebody announcing there are fake Rolexes on the Bangkok streets?"

Meanwhile the Global Anti-Counterfeiting Group (GACG) announced last week that it would award Thailand's Intellectual Property Department its Global Anti-Counterfeiting Award 2012 in the National Public Bodies, in recognition of their crackdowns on piracy!