You Cannot Copyright a Workout: Fitness Formats, Studio Brands, and the Rights in Moving People Around a Room
By Casey Scott McKay ·
A fitness business believes it owns its format, and it almost certainly does not. This article explains why a sequence of exercises falls into the gap between choreography and a method of operation, what the Bikram yoga litigation actually decided, and where the protectable assets in a fitness business really sit. It works through the brand, the trade dress, the instructor relationship, the certification programme, the music licences almost every studio gets wrong, and the streaming content that is genuinely copyrightable. It closes with the structural insight that explains why the successful formats are franchises rather than copyrights.
IP and Technology > Copyright | Article | Published 18 March 2024 - Updated 24 February 2025 | Casey Scott McKay - marksy.us
The conversation every fitness lawyer has
A founder has spent four years developing a class. Fifty minutes, a specific sequence of movements, particular timing, particular cueing, a particular way of building intensity and bringing it down. It works. People come back. Instructors trained in it produce consistent results, and instructors not trained in it produce something noticeably worse.
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