Where’s intellectual property law when you need it?

On a recent visit to a dupermarket I couldn’t help noticing a largely harmless exercise in greenwashing, tooting their horn about the fact that about 0.01% of their packaging by weight is made of corn-based plastics.  The tamper-evident seal on the box of Quaker® Multi-Grain Hot Cereal is made of EarthFirst® PLA film and NatureWorks® polymer. Whoa, back up a step! Obviously EarthFirst® is not to be confused with Earth First!

Quaker Oats carton with “Earth First” logo

I suppose this is par for the course. The Quaker Oats Company itself took its name from an already-existing organization. Naturally they sued the real Quakers for trademark infringement!