Musicology

Last week I wrote an article (not for Musicologize) asking about when we might be able to say the pendulum had swung back and away from the supposed floodgates opened years ago by “Blurred Lines.” Each appropriately adjudicated case since has been met with the idea that it’s compensatory or a regression toward a norm, …

Freeplay Music, a production music library founded by renowned composer Scott Schreer, who is best known for the iconic theme to the NFL On Fox Sports, sued CNN late last year, claiming CNN had used tracks from Freeplay across hundreds of videos airing in the Phillippines, Indonesia, Chile, and perhaps elsewhere without securing the proper …

But what’s in it for you? If you’ve heard the recording of Sinatra singing Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise, or perhaps the song that put everyone on notice that AI music had arrived, “Heart On My Sleeve,” which was a collab involving neither The Weeknd nor Drake, you know the music industry has a problem, deep fakes. …

This makes it at least three times Dua Lipa has been sued over “Levitating.” We’ve covered the first two more than enough here, expecting both cases to go quietly away. One already has, the Artikal Sound System case, and the other may soon follow, the Wiggle And Giggle one, but this new one is more …

Last month the US Copyright Office hosted hours of listening sessions online in which various players discussed hopes and concerns around copyright and generative AI. When Ghostwriter977 released “Heart On My Sleeve,” it was our wakeup call, similar in some ways to that week back in December when we all found out about ChatGPT and …

Although Bad Bunny is just one of about a gazillion named defendants, his recent motion to dismiss might spell the end of this entire “Fish Market” vs Reggaeton fiasco. And it could actually do a ton of good for music copyright in general. Fisaco might not quite tell it. If I were to post a …

As pretty much everyone knows, Ed Sheeran was found not to have copied “Let’s Get It On” in creating “Thinking Out Loud.” More specifically, the first of several questions on the jury form was, “Did Sheeran establish… that he independently created Thinking Out Loud…?” to which the jury answered yes, and put down their pencils. …

Influence is not infringement. Nor is it copying. Nor should artists need to pretend they’re influenced by nobody, lest they get sued. When the Jonas Brothers say they’re influenced by the records that played in their house growing up, let them. And when you think you hear those bands in “The Album” (that’s what they …

Copyright has seen this movie before, a new technology comes along that lowers the barriers to getting stuff for free, and rightsholders, not unreasonably, panic. And then, they litigate, like “dinosaurs suing to prevent the ice age,” as I’ve heard it put. But the tech always wins, pretty much. My first instinct is to take …

Not quite two weeks after Ed Sheeran was found not to have copied Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On,” the same judge, yesterday, dismissed a second case with a different plaintiff, Structured Asset Sales, which owns a stake in “Let’s Get It On” as well. “Let’s Get It On” v. “Thinking Out Loud” is the …