As you are probably aware, YOLO — You Only Live Once — has become the motto of choice for those tweeting their drunken, ill-advised, life-affirming misadventures. Crash your car into the town's Christmas tree after drag racing with your friends at 4 a.m.? #YOLO. Drunkenly eat two plates of disco fries or wake up next to your best friends S.O.? #YOLO. In short order, YOLO has become an essential, sometimes grating axiom for millennials — a "Tune in, turn on, drop out," for the Four Loko generation.
But the man who introduced YOLO into the modern vernacular, the surprisingly well-mannered Canadian rapper Drake, is frustrated over the proliferation of shirts, hats, and other such retail offerings that this four-character cri de coeur has spawned. On Instagram, Drake posted the comment, "Walgreens....you gotta either chill or cut the cheque," along with a photograph of branded YOLO baseball caps. Similar comments suggest that the rapper wants to cash in on the trend he helped create — a perfectly reasonable, capitalistic impulse. Yet, even though he and dozens of others want to trademark YOLO, it's hard to imagine anyone being able to lasso this horse so long after it's left the barn. But, y'know, you gotta try, right? We mean, even if you wind up buried by piles of legal work while Chinese factories turn out boxer shorts covered with fake Bart Simpsons yelling the motto you created, there's money to be made and...well...YOLO. (Gawker)
Photo: Via Instagram/Champagnepapi