Musician Sues Summit Entertainment For Taking Down His Song In Twilight Dispute

from the takedowns dept

This one is a bit confusing, but an artist named Matthew Smith apparently wrote a song back in 2002, but late last year he tried to re-market the song by trying to associate it with the Twilight Saga movies. He did so by doing some sort of deal with the company that sells pre-movie ads to promote the song in various theaters... and by getting an image designed as the "cover" image for the song that was inspired by the Twilight Saga -- using a moon and a similar font to the movie's advertisement. Summit -- who has shown itself to be ridiculously overprotective of its trademarks and copyrights issued a takedown to YouTube, where the song was hosted. This part isn't clear, because I'm not sure where the song image was included on the YouTube page. I guess in the video, but the article linked above doesn't say.

YouTube, of course, took down the video, and a back and forth between lawyers ensued, with Summit claiming that the image represented trademark infringement -- and claiming that YouTube "does not differentiate between copyright infringement and trademark infringement." I'm not quite sure that's true, and it makes me wonder if Summit actually sent a DMCA notice, which you're not supposed to use for trademarks, or if it sent a different type of takedown notice (entirely possible). Either way, Smith has sued first, claiming misrepresentation by Summit, and saying that the song clearly doesn't infringe on Twilight's copyright, because it was written well before the Twilight Saga existed. Of course, as the article at THResq notes, in doing so, Smith also shows that he misrepresented himself in advertising that the song was "inspired" by the Twilight Saga.

It doesn't seem like he really has much of a case here. While I think it was probably pretty pointless and petty for Summit to issue the takedown, it's entirely possible that the guy was infringing. The real question is whether or not Summit really did make a copyright claim here, rather than a trademark claim -- but even if that's the case, I can't see the "damages" being that high. Either way, it seems like another silly intellectual property-inspired legal fight, that has little to do with what either copyright or trademark law were intended to do.

Filed Under: copyright, dmca, music, takedowns, trademark, twilight, youtube
Companies: summit entertainment

Record Labels Planning Yet Another Way To Try To Get You To Rebuy Music You Already 'Bought'

from the not-adding-value dept

For years, the strategy of the entertainment industry is to come out with "new formats" that more or less require people to rebuy the content they've already purchased so that they can use it on modern equipment. One of the things that worries them so much about digital content is the idea that it might be somewhat future-proof, in that it can be moved from device to device with ease. Yet, it won't stop them from trying. A whole bunch of you sent in this story about how Apple and some of the labels are looking at ways to sell (really "license") higher quality versions of digital music files. Amusingly, almost everyone who submitted this sent it in with some sort of sneering line about how this is clearly yet another attempt by the labels to get people to re-"buy" the same music they had already bought, suggesting an awful lot of people aren't very interested in such a deal. Honestly, if the labels are serious about offering higher quality files, they should let people upgrade their existing authorized versions as a thank you for actually paying, instead of getting unauthorized versions. Otherwise, it seems pretty likely that people will decide to go for the unauthorized option anyway. Consumers aren't stupid, no matter how much some folks in the industry seem to think they are.

Filed Under: music, quality
Companies: apple

The Next Generation Of Music Services Need To Go Beyond Replicating The Analog In The Digital World

from the bingo dept

We've challenged some of Forrester analyst Mark Mulligan's claims in the past -- such as the idea that music can't be free, that the answer to record label problems is to do windowed releases and his recent assertion that digital music has "failed." However, outside of some questionable claims like these, his insights into the music business are generally quite good and valuable. For example, he has an excellent piece up at Mashable highlighting how the next generation of music consumers is coming along and the industry faces a very big challenge in capturing their attention. He notes that the original Napster generation -- defined as "the Millenials," were one thing, but they were mainly taking the analog world they knew and making it digital. It's the next generation -- the "digital natives" who have always lived digitally that are driving things now:

The Digital Natives give us a sneak peak at the future. Millennials looked like the future for a while but their behavior has a finite life span. For example, ripping and burning CDs, even downloading from BitTorrent and iTunes both recreate the analog behavior of getting units of music. This is because they started out in the analog era. They are the transition generation with transitional behaviors.

Digital Natives don't have that analog era baggage. All they’ve known is digital. Online video and mobile are their killer apps. These Digital Natives see music as the pervasive soundtrack to their interactive, immersive, social environments. Ownership matters less. Place of origin matters less. Context and experience is everything. In a world beyond content scarcity, experience is now everything. With "free" infecting everything, the content itself is no longer king. Experience now has the throne.

Exactly (and nice to see we've gotten past the idea that music can't be "free"). Mulligan then comes up with a very consultant-speak version of what new digital products must have, saying they need to be Social, Participative, Accessible, Relevant and Connected. I'd argue that social and participative and connected and accessible are redundancies, but it's still a good general list. Unfortunately, there's little indication that the industry recognizes all of this. In many cases, they're still fighting the last battle against the last generation. In doing so, as Mulligan notes, they're almost certain to screw up their chance to interest the next generation as well.

Filed Under: business models, digital natives, mark mulligan, music

When Musicians Get Excited About Remixes, Cool Things Happen: Jay-Z, Nick Drake And Jason Parker Do Jazz

from the remix-it dept

A few months back we wrote about jazz musician Jason Parker, who was doing a variety of interesting experiments on the business model side, and also making some top notch music (his No More, No Less album has become a regular in my "albums to work to" list...). He's been working on a new project of jazz interpretations of Nick Drake's first album, funded in part via Kickstarter. Of course, lots of albums are being funded via Kickstarter these days, so there was nothing all that special about that (other than that it's a cool idea).

However, he recently released a "remix" of a song from that upcoming album, mashed up with Jay-Z. You can listen to it here: Parker explained how this came about:

You may know that I play with an incredible rapper/hip-hop guru called Spekulation. Spek, as we call him, is super talented as a lyricist, performer, producer and beat maker. He also likes to cut shit up and stitch it back together in strange and wonderful ways.

Not thinking about any of this, I sent him some rough mixes of the forthcoming JPQ Nick Drake CD because I respect his ears and wanted to hear what he thought. What I got back was this remix. He cut up our take of "Day Is Done" with Jay-Z's "Can't Knock The Hustle", and lo and behold it was magic! Spek then asked for more mixes, so I sent him all 10 tracks. He cut 'em all up with various Jay-Z tunes and we now have a full remix album, completed before the original tunes. Go figure...

So enjoy this little sneak-peak into not one, but two forthcoming CD’s! You'll get to hear the rest sometime toward the end of March.

There are a few different things to note here. First, it's pretty cool to see just how excited Parker is about all of this. He sent off a work to a friend, who sent back a very cool mashup with a different artist from a different genre and asked for more. Parker happily sent the other tracks over, and now he's thrilled that he's got a full remix/mashup album ready before he's even released his new album. Thankfully, Jay-Z has also made it clear over the years that he isthrilled and "honored" to have his work remixed with others.

Of course, in a very traditional sense, there's an awful lot of "infringement" going on here, but most of the parties are happily ignoring that because they realize that what comes out of it is something really cool. It might not match your personal taste in music, but it's pretty cool to think that three very different artists all end up coming together to create something magical and enjoyable, and part of it happened just because a third party ("Spek") decided to make it happen.

Filed Under: culture, jason parker, jay-z, jazz, music, nick drake

Did The Record Labels Kill The Golden Goose In Music Video Games?

from the of-course-they-did... dept

For the last decade or so, every year the major record labels seem to bet on some single "magic bullet" to fix all that ails them. They go through phases. There was their own crappy DRM'd and locked-down music stores. There were ringtones. And... there were music video games like Guitar Hero and Rockband. And, of course, as soon as those games actually started helping the recording industry, the industry decided to suck them dry. Edgar Bronfman kicked it off by declaring angrily that those games had to pay much more to license the music -- even though the music in those games tended to lead to much greater sales of albums for those artists.

And now it looks like the labels may have succeeded in bleeding those types of games dry. With Activision announcing that it was dumping Guitar Hero, one of the major reasons given is the high cost of licensing music. Yup, the labels priced things so high that they made it impractical to actually offer any more. Yet another case of the labels overvaluing their own content. Now, it's also true that these games haven't evolved that much, and people haven't seen the point of buying new versions, but part of that lack of evolving is because so much of the budget had to go towards overpaying for music, rather than innovating.

Filed Under: guitar hero, music, video games
Companies: activision

Music Publisher Discovers A Song In Its Catalog Has Been Heavily Sampled For Decades... Sues Everyone

from the statute-of-limitations? dept

Over at THREsq, they have the story of a small music publisher by the name of Drive-In Music. Apparently it holds the rights to the song "Let A Woman Be A Woman" by Dyke & The Blazers: A UK-based band called The Heavy apparently used the music in that song as the basis for its song "How You Like Me Now?" The music seems pretty clearly to come from the earlier song. Of course, Drive-In only noticed all of this after Hyundai used this song in a commercial it ran during last year's Superbowl: Rather than just suing those behind the Heavy's song, Drive In has basically gone on a legal rampage. It sued pretty much everyone even loosely connected with the song. So, it sued the label... but also the ad agency that put together the ad, the NFL for having the commercial during the Super Bowl and CBS for airing the ad. Apparently that lawsuit was settled, which is too bad, as it seems like many of those parties could push back on the claims.

Since then, however, Drive-In has suddenly discovered that the song has been sampled in a bunch of other songs, and has decided to sue over all of them. THREsq has a list:

• In July, Drive-in Music sued Sony BMG, Ruthless Records, and others for use of "Let a Woman Be a Woman" in the seminal gangster rap hit, "Menace to Society" by the group, Above the Law
• In August, Drive-in Music sued Capitol Records for use of "Let a Woman Be a Woman" in the 1990 rap song, "Diss You" from rapper, King Tee
• In September, Drive-in Music sued Busta Rhymes, Warner Music, Elektra Entertainment, Atlantic Recording Company and others for use of "Let a Woman Be a Woman" in 1991 old-school hip hop song, "Case of the P.T.A."
• In September, Drive-in Music sued Universal Music Group, Interscope-Geffen-A&M Group, and Beck Hansen for use of "Let a Woman Be a Woman" in the 1997 Beck song "Jack-Ass" from the Odelay album
• In fact, just this week, Drive-in Music has filed a second lawsuit over that very same Beck song. The company is going after the publisher, Cyandide Breathmint Music, the Dust Brothers, and various subsidiaries of UMG.

Of course, if I remember correctly (and you copyright lawyers out there, feel free to chime in), the statute of limitations on copyright is three years. I believe that this doesn't prevent Drive-In from suing over those older songs, but it would limit any damages to what's happened with those songs in the past three years (meaning: likely not very much).

Filed Under: music, samples
Companies: drive-in music

YouTube Notes That Free Music, With Ads, Pays As Well, If Not Better, Than Paid

from the those-digital-dimes-add-up dept

One of the more frustrating things about watching people declare certain things as "fact" in the tech world is the failure to recognize the rate of change and trends as they go. For example, for years, people dismissed the idea that music on YouTube could effectively be monetized if it was available for "free." And yet, now YouTube is noting that free music can actually pay just as well as paid music services, and the trend certainly suggests that the money from the free music on YouTube is growing much faster in its earning potential than any paid service. Of course, how long will it take for the major record labels to recognize this. Warner Music has already declared that it won't do any more free streaming deals. On top of that, the rumors about both Spotify and Google Music in the US have all been about how the labels don't want to allow much free music to be offered. How many times does it need to be explained to record label execs that "free" does not necessarily mean "no money," and when done correctly, it can actually mean "more money."

Filed Under: business models, economics, free, music, streaming, youtube

UK Music Lobbyist Says Rethinking Fair Use Is 'Intellectual Masturbation'

from the who-needs-fair-use? dept

We've talked a few times about how the UK is going through yet another copyright rethink with a key focus (among others) on whether or not the country needs more expansive fair use rules within copyright. While we've seen similar discussions happen (and be ignored) in the UK, the good news is that the panel investigating this issue seems to include some really knowledgeable folks on the subject. Of course, it appears that some of the established interests aren't so thrilled about all of this.

Andrew Dubber kindly sent over an article from Music Week, which is locked up behind a paywall, or I'd point you to it, in which various music industry folks fret about this awful concept of fair use. The article seems to be based on the ridiculous premise that "fair use" is something that only harms creative folks, and is only designed to help tech firms. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth, and it's troubling that these supposed "music industry" experts don't realize just how important fair use is in content creation itself. The article quotes a person from PPL insisting that supporting fair use is a straight up choice between "helping Google or helping our creative industries." That someone in the content creation business is against fair use is a travesty, and it suggests that they know very little about content creation. Furthermore, the idea that this is an "us against them" sort of thing is equally troubling. The point of fair use is to make content creation itself better and to provide more value to the world.

But the most ridiculous comments of all come from UK Music chief Feargal Sharkey, who has a way with saying silly things. According Sharkey, rethinking fair use is "a distraction at best" and really just an "exercise in intellectual masturbation." I'm sorry, but if Sharkey thinks fair use is just about "intellectual masturbation," he should not be leading an organization representing musicians. Fair use is incredibly important to all sorts of content creators, and it's a shame that the guy who's supposed to be representing them is now forcefully arguing against fair use. It should make the members of UK Music seriously consider who they've picked to speak for them.

Filed Under: copyright, fair use, feargal sharkey, music, uk