What happens when the legality of trademark registration collides with the market forces surrounding a cultural movement?  This is the question confronting Allie Mitrovich, a TikTok creator who goes by the handle AllieRoseCo, as she has found herself in the midst of an online firestorm.  On August 27, 2024, Allie filed a trademark application for the mark HOT GIRLS READ.  The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office registered the mark on February 3, 2026.  When it became publicly known, the online book community was furious. 

The issue is that the phrase “Hot Girls Read” has been in widespread use across social media platforms, like TikTok and Instagram, for some time.  The origin of the phrase is unclear, but it spread organically and became something of a cultural identity for book enthusiasts.  That community now feels betrayed by one of its members attempting to register as a commercial mark what the community considers its shared identity.

What a Trademark Does and Does Not Do

As a trademark attorney with more than two decades in brand protection, I find that some of the online anger here is misdirected and it may help to explain briefly what a trademark actually does.  A trademark is a brand identifier.  It informs the public about the source of goods and services.  For example, when someone sees a restaurant with “golden arches,” they know that restaurant is part of the McDonald’s® franchise and, therefore, they know what products will be available inside and what quality they can expect.  Therefore, the golden arches function as a trademark. 

When the USPTO reviews a trademark application, one of the main areas of their focus is whether the mark acts as a brand identifier.  Another application, for HOT GIRLS READ BOOKS, which was filed before Allie’s application, was rejected for this very reason.  The applicant offered online printing services and presented HOT GIRLS READ BOOKS as a phrase customers could select to have printed on products. The USPTO found that the phrase was functioning as content being delivered, not as a brand identifying the source of the printing service itself. That distinction matters: a mark has to tell consumers who is selling the goods or services, not just describe what is being sold or printed.  In Allie’s case, the USPTO decided that the mark as it was shown in the specimen she provided was a proper brand that identified the products as having come from her company.

Equally important to this issue, however, is what a trademark does not do.  Specifically, even a registered trademark does not claim ownership of a phrase in the cultural sense.  In other words, it does not prevent casual use, social media bios, book club names, or other non-commercial contexts. 

Enforcement: The Sharper Grievance

While some in the community have a generalized frustration with registering the mark, others are more focused.  A trademark registration gives its owner the right to enforce its mark; in other words, to stop or prevent others from using the mark on goods that may cause confusion in the market as to their source.  In fact, a trademark owner who fails to “police” its mark risks weakening its ability to enforce it later, including through defenses like acquiescence or even cancellation for abandonment.

What seems to have ruffled the most feathers is that Allie posted on Instagram that she was aware that others were selling goods covered by her registration (bookmarks, stickers, notebooks, t-shirts, etc.) with the HOT GIRLS READ mark and she asked them, politely, to remove those listings.  This is exactly what a trademark owner can and should do to protect its brand.  It is being perceived, however, as shutting down other small businesses that helped to build the brand to which she is laying claim.

It is worth noting here that this is not the only registered “Hot Girl” mark.  There are other active registrations, including HOT GIRLS VOTE, HOT GIRLS DO BARRE, and even HOT GIRLS HAVE IBS.  Many other “Hot Girl” marks are currently pending.  We are seeing a growing trend of registrations built on internet phrases that develop cultural weight.

Legality vs. Market

​What is interesting in this case is not whether the mark was properly registered, it was.  Nor is it whether Allie’s actions to enforce her mark are defensible, which they certainly are.  Rather, what makes this case unusual is the intersection between the legality of trademark registration and the forces in the mark’s relevant market.

While trademark law gives a registrant rights to protect a mark, it does not give the registrant a market.  In this case, the online community that helped build the cultural resonance behind “Hot Girls Read” is also the most likely customer base for the goods covered by the mark.  With this in mind, how does a brand built on a community identity navigate enforcement without alienating the community itself?

Practical Takeaways

The HOT GIRLS READ situation illustrates a distinction that every brand owner should understand. Registering a trademark requires answering two related but separate questions. The first is whether a mark is legally registrable, a technical question that trademark law is well-equipped to address. The second, and often more consequential question, is whether registering a particular mark serves the business's long-term interests. Those two questions do not always have the same answer. When a phrase carries cultural weight, registration may be legally available but strategically complex, particularly when the community most associated with the phrase is also the brand's primary market. Brand strategy and trademark strategy need to be aligned from the beginning, and a good trademark attorney brings value to both sides of that conversation.

What Are Your Thoughts?

This is a case I intend to monitor closely.  But, what do you think?  Do you view this as a savvy entrepreneur riding the momentum of a cultural phenomenon?  Is it an affront to the online reading community?  Have you faced a similar tension in your own business between what the law permits and what your market will accept?  I would be interested in hearing from brand owners who have navigated this question.

In a prior blog post, I discussed protecting trademarks with the emergence of new generic top level domains (gTLDs).  In this post, I discuss obtaining trademark protection for the gTLD itself, when that gTLD consists of a trademarked term.