Legal intimidation, copyright infringement, and stolen secret recipes: if CakeTok hasn’t made its way onto your For You Page yet, first of all, I’m jealous. Second, you may have managed to avoid one of TikTok’s most unexpectedly dramatic feuds. 

In a tearful apology video posted a few weeks ago, TikTok creator Sweet Treats by Ashley revealed that another creator was threatening legal action over what they claimed was a stolen cake pop recipe. The video has since amassed over 23 million views, garnering attention from cake bakers, drama lovers, and… Snooki? Yeah, that Snooki. 

Recipe Theft, Allegedly 

Ashley had just started her modest cake pop business a couple of weeks prior. Using TikTok as a promotional platform, she gave followers a behind-the-scenes look at her business, sharing everything from developing new cake pop recipes to towing her signature pink refrigerated cart around town. 

The recipe that has been caught in the middle of this dispute was none other than a now-infamous Fruity Pebbles cake pop recipe. Ashley had posted a video of herself creating the new flavor for her business, with a creator by the name of Cake by Kaity tagged in the description. 

The video itself is pretty innocuous. It only shows a cake pop being dipped into white icing mixed with Fruity Pebbles cereal. Harry Styles’ “Watermelon Sugar” plays in the background. 

That’s it. No ingredients list. No step-by-step tutorial. The presumed inspiration behind the recipe was fairly tagged in the description. 

But that’s not exactly how Cake by Kaity saw it. 

Shortly afterward, Kaity, another cake-baking small business owner on TikTok, uploaded a response to Ashley’s video, claiming that her recipe had been stolen by Ashley. Kaity asserted that she had consorted with legal counsel over the situation who had determined that she had the right to demand Ashley take her video down or else she would pursue legal action. 

Of course, Kaity’s accusatory video set the stage for Ashley’s now-viral apology from a Walmart parking lot. 

Can Recipes Be Copyright Protected? 

At the center of Kaity’s claims to legal recipe ownership is the idea that, because she has published cookbooks containing her cake pop recipes, those recipes are fully protected by copyright. Therefore, anyone who uses her copyrighted material for their own financial gain is infringing on her legal rights. But can recipes even be copyright protected in the first place? 

Well, yes. And also no. 

A cookbook in and of itself can be protected by copyright law. That is, the actual literature and the wording of the cookbook can be protected from plagiarism, like any other published form of writing would be.

But an individual list of ingredients or a formulated process cannot be protected by copyright alone. So Ashley using a similar ingredients list in her TikTok video to one that might appear in Kaity’s cookbook is hardly enough to make a case for copyright infringement. 

In my opinion, the funniest part of this entire situation is that Kaity’s recipe includes ready-made ingredients like Betty Crocker cake mix and, obviously, Fruity Pebbles cereal. The other additions? Eggs. Sugar. 

Groundbreaking. 

Vindication for Ashley 

After Ashley’s apology video went viral, the internet quickly rallied behind her, leaving more than 40,000 supportive comments on the video, including one from Snooki, who apparently loves internet drama as much as the rest of us. Her message? “You have my support, queen.” 

Us too, girl. Us too. 

Ashley now has more than 700 thousand followers on TikTok and appears to be reaping the benefits of her newfound viral attention, with business seemingly booming. 

Kaity has since deleted her scathing response video and replaced it with an apology video, uploaded just a day after the initial backlash. 

Final Thoughts 

But now that the loose ends have been tied up and the drama has fizzled out, I can’t help but feel a little surprised by how this all played out. As someone who has spent more time on ArtTok than CakeTok, I was shocked by how quickly the internet rallied behind Ashley, the alleged idea stealer, rather than defending the creative property of a small business owner. 

For comparison, in the art world, things like “artistic style” cannot be copyrighted, but adopting another artist’s signature style too closely is still widely frowned upon and often called out online. Likewise, I’m a little skeptical of the idea that just because it’s not illegal to sell someone else’s recipe, that we should openly embrace it or encourage it. 

And that’s where this situation gets a little more complicated. The question isn’t just whether Kaity had a legal claim, but why the internet was so quick to decide who was right and who was wrong.

My hot take? I think this entire situation, and who the internet ultimately decided to side with, came down to optics. Ashley is a sensitive, doe-eyed, young woman who posted a vulnerable video of herself crying online. Kaity, on the other hand, is a little older in age. She’s more experienced in her business. And she comes across as more assertive and, to some, maybe even a little aggressive. 

But the internet doesn’t respond to situations based on facts alone. Tone, personality, and presentation all play a huge role in how people interpret a conflict, especially when it unfolds through short-form videos where context is limited and emotions are amplified. 

In the end, I don’t think there is a clear hero or villain, but there’s certainly a clear winner and loser. Although there are valid arguments on both sides, the way the internet reacted was shaped just as much by the people involved as it was by the actual issue at hand.

Who do you think is in the wrong over this Fruity Pebbles cake pop recipe? Let us know your thoughts on the situation in the comments!