ALL POSTS
Sirius XM’s ’70’s on 7′ Copyright Clash
On a long road trip, there seems to be nothing more calming than rolling down the windows and turning up the radio. However, the predominance of commercials on most mainstream radio stations seems to completely disrupt such tranquility. Being interrupted by a...
Street Art: At the Crossroads of Creative Rights and Consumerism
Banksy, Shepard Fairey, Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat are artists, whose names are creeping out from the underground world of urban street art, passing through the fine art world and entering mainstream culture and its marketplace. An aesthetic that, at one...
“Big Pimpin” Emphasizes the US Commitment to Economics Over the Moral Rights of Musicians
The song “Big Pimpin” by Jay-Z became a nationwide hit in 1999 and reached number 18 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart. [1] The song came under scrutiny in the District Court for the Central District of California and re-opened the issue of moral rights for artists...
The Battle Over “Happy Birthday”
Each time we turn a year older, our friends and relatives sing “Happy Birthday”. This song is part of the American birthday tradition for millions of people, but companies have paid licensing fees to Warner/Chappell Music Inc. for its use. Warner/Chappell Music...
98 Problems
On October 14th, 2015, Jay-Z and Timbaland appeared in a Los Angeles federal court for copyright infringement regarding a sample used in their 1999 hit, Big Pimpin. This court appearance marked the beginning of the end of an eight-year legal battle, which began in...
“Dancing Baby” Case Represents Huge Win for Fair Use
YouTube content providers breathed a collective sigh of relief after a landmark decision last month from the Ninth Circuit. The panel held that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) compels copyright holders to consider whether a particular use is fair before...
DOJ Requests Comment on Performing Rights Organizations’ Licensing of Joint Works
Last month, the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice (DOJ) requested public comment on several issues regarding Performing Rights Organizations (PRO)’s licensing of jointly owned works.[1] The request was made as part of the Division’s review of the...
Who’s the Real Champ?
Just a little over four months ago, nearly 3 million people purchased PPV (pay-per-view) through Showtime and HBO to watch the so-called fight of the century. With a $100 pay-per-view price tag, both Showtime and HBO made upwards of $300 million. However, this number...
Did Millions of Facebook Users Receive their J.D.’s Overnight?
In a sudden pursuit to protect their privacy, it appears that several of my Facebook friends and their friends, even those whom are neither lawyers, nor enrolled in law school, have become experts in copyright law. It seems that they have miraculously received their...
In the Name of Narcos: The Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria Trademark
I finished season one of Netflix’s Narcos, but Rodrigo Amarante’s hypnotic theme song “Tuyo” continues to play on in my head weeks later. Narcos dramatizes the rise and fall of the Colombian “King of Cocaine” Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria and the drug war between the...