So maybe I was a bit harsh. You touched on one of my pet peeves. It seems like the internet's favorite thing to do when looking at design is call out something as a "ripoff of X." People often mistake the popular examples of a certain style as "original" while not understanding their place as part of a larger movement.

If you read the case study, they clearly explain how they were heavily influenced by the 1960s design program for MIT Tech Review done by Cooper, Casey & Coburn. And of course the original CCC work was not at all "original" since it strictly followed the same Swiss International Style principles that literally almost all graphic design studios were churning out back then.

In the 80s the international style went through a revival and hence why American Apparel's branding looks like that. So American Apparel ripped off all of the the famous mid-century design studios....who ultimately ripped off the work coming out of swiss schools in the 1920s...which ultimately was a rip-off of the foundational aspects around which sans-serif typefaces were invented.