Body Science sing The Same Old Song

Body Science sing The Same Old Song
Recording artists Sam Smith and Tom Petty came to an out of court settlement in 2014 after similarities were spotted between Smith's song 'Stay With Me' and Petty's classic 'Won't Back Down'.
According to The Sun, the settlement included Petty and ELO singer-composer Jeff Lynne being given a 12.5% writing credit due to the chord progression and melody lines of Smith's song not being a great enough departure from those recorded by Petty.
Some listeners say they can hear the likeness - even going so far as to say they confuse the two songs - while others believe it's inevitable that music will overlap given the finite number of chords and words available to artists.
The case has re-fuelled the debate about what amounts to copyright infringement and the theft of intellectual property. Many critics argue music to be the most difficult medium in this respect, especially given the tradition of artists sampling, and being inspired by, the work of others. Much easier to spot however are products being duplicated in the commercial world, particularly in emerging markets such as the supplement industry. That brings us to the case of Australia's largest supplement company, BSC.
Unlike the Smith/Petty example there seems to be no grey area as to whether a portion of BSC's success is attributable to the work of other companies. A quick trip to Google is enough to confirm the company's name is not unique. A company in Sweden was using the name Body Science for quite some time before the Australian company Body Science was born. BSC is merely an evolvement of another company's name, and just the start of a trend in the Australian company's business model.
Many of its flagship products share a lot of similarities with those that have been market leaders for years. One of their first offerings was a product called 'Hydroxy Burn', a capsulated diet pill or fat burner. This was modelled on the global phenomena 'Hydroxy Cuts' from the USA. This product helped establish BSC in the Australian market. BSC's 'Hydoxyburn Pro Diet' was an almost exact replica and before BSC rebranded, it was almost impossible to tell the two apart. The US version was out long before the BSC version.

Another example is the BSC compression gear, which bears a striking resemblance to Skins products that brought compression tights and garments to mainstream clothing stores. Funnily enough, the BSC compression gear was created just after Skins products proved popular.

BSC's 'TX100 Green Tea' is probably their most blatant copy of another market leading product - 'Green Tea X50'. BSC originally came out with black packaging for their TX100 tea, however after poor sales they have rebranded to a white carton eerily similar to that of the best-selling X50. While BSC has chosen to rebrand almost their entire range in black packaging, they have opted to make their TX100 tea in the same green and white colours as X50 in an attempt to gain more sales.

Not content with "sampling" those products, BSC has gone on to offer a fat burner called 'Hydroxy Shred' - which appears to have taken on the name of another protein called Max's 'Hydroxy Phase Super Shred' and the appearance of Optimum Nutrition's market leading 'Gold Standard Pre Workout'.

Sadly, regulations in the supplement industry are still in their infancy, leaving one company to effectively steal the appearance and recipe of a product without any repercussions. The quality and originality of a product now hardly seems to matter. All that does is a company's ability to spread the word.
Regulation withstanding, Gregory Young and Nathan Picklum of BSC aren't likely to change their tune anytime soon, and neither are their competition. The former will belt out an old favourite from a band that broke its share of hearts. The latter's will be a modern day love ballad calling out for loyalty.
Can you hear the difference?

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