Apparently, the joke wasn't that funny. At least not enough for U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman of the Southern District of New York to grant attorney fees and costs to a company that prevailed against fashion icon Louis Vuitton's copyright infringement suit on parody grounds.

My Other Bag, as its name suggests, created a line of products using the popular “My other car is a …” bumper-sticker refrain to parody the upscale fashion brand. The unamused Louis Vuitton sued the bag pranksters for trademark infringement, trademark dilution, and copyright infringement.

In 2016, Furman granted summary judgment in favor of My Other Bag, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld the decision, and the U.S. Supreme Court denied Louis Vuitton's petition for a writ of certiorari.

Furman said My Other Bag did not avail in its motion for attorney fees and costs under the Lanham Act and Copyright Act. There was no “reason to pile on further” by awarding attorney fees and costs to My Other Bag's counsel, “however sympathetic its cause may be,” Furman wrote.

The judge's decision rebutting My Other Bag's Lanham Act claims turned largely on the application of the Supreme Court's 2014 decision in Octane Fitness v. ICON Health & Fitness. In that case, the high court ruled on “parallel language” found in the U.S. Patent Act that “exceptional cases” threshold for the awarding of attorney fees to prevailing parties in copyright cases was crossed when the filing of the suit was unreasonable.

Furman said, despite Louis Vuitton's defeat, the same logic in Octane Fitness should apply here, where the fashion company's actions were born out of reasonable concerns, if aggressively pursued.

Of potential interest going forward is the fact, noted by Furman, that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has not dealt with the potential conflict of Octane Fitness on its own circuit precedent, “opting on two occasions to defer it to another day.” An appeal in the suit would give the appellate court the chance to take the issue on directly.

Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher's Howard Hogan led Louis Vuitton's legal action in this matter. He declined to comment on the decision.

Miller Korzenik Sommers name attorney David Korzenik led the latest leg of litigation for My Other Bag. He told the New York Law Journal the case was being reviewed, but an appeal was likely in the offing.