I am curious to know if this story of OBEY Giant issuing a cease and desist to Baxter Orr is legit or not; as it certainly appears to be. It's sadly ironic that a company founded on / popularized by manipulating existing images into their own style would bring out the legal guns when someone does it to them. Does the Shepard Fairey crew pay royalties to the photographers they base their works on? I somehow doubt it.

The strangest part being that the works of Baxter Orr are hardly a threat to the print making, clothes manufacturing, book producing empire that OBEY has become. I highly doubt someone buys the "Dope" Obama poster when they meant to get the "Hope" version from OBEY.

Link via Jeremy.

UPDATE: Apparently it is true and, as one would suspect, there is more to the story than just a simple infringement or parody. Baxter Orr apparently has been involved in some shenanigans with re-selling OBEY merch and this whole debacle just serves as an opportunity for the Shepard Fairey / OBEY crew to take action when they have been unable to do so before. While I still believe that OBEY has become more of a 'corporate' giant than one would imagine it could be, this scenario swings positively in their court; not negatively.