Originally published at: Ed Sheeran says he'll quit music if he loses copyright lawsuit | Boing Boing
…
2 Likes
As has been noted elsewhere, if Sheeran loses this one, then pretty much everyone might as well give up music now, and just give all their money to the copyright lawyers as we argue over the ownership of D major and the tonic sol-fa.
The only upside that I can see is that the weird popularity of the "AI"s that are doing “singer X covers song Y” right now will also go away, so there is that.
20 Likes
Well, fingers crossed!
9 Likes
Well, now I’m not sure which way to root. /s
No, seriously, Ed’s right. I hope he prevails. I don’t have to care for his music to understand how terrible things are getting on the music copyright front.
26 Likes
I mean, on that basis every AC/DC song ever infringes on every Black Sabbath song which in turn infringes on every Kiss song ever written, and Kiss’ entire catalog boils down to one long, tedious plagiarism of Louie Louie. There are (probably) legitimate cases of copyright infringement to be litigated, but this isn’t one of them.
19 Likes
Is the estate of Marvin Gaye particularly litigious or something? Because this isn’t the first time they’ve done this.
Someone should find a song similar to a Marvin song, that predates it, and have the copyright holder of that song come after Marvin’s estate. Fair is fair.
13 Likes
It only looks that way. The Blurred Lines suit was brought by Marvin Gaye’s estate, while this one is being brought by the estate of Ed Townsend, who co- wrote Let’s Get it On. Apparently the Gaye estate is staying out of it.
5 Likes
It’s not Gaye’s estate that is suing; it’s a company hired by the family of the co-songwriter on the song, Ed Townsend.
FWIW, Blurred Lines was absolutely an obvious rip-off of Got to Give It Up; and Pharrell, not the most ethical of musicians, basically admitted it in court.
7 Likes
I don’t see where there could possibly be ‘harm’ to the Marvin Gaye track, therefor it feels like a lawsuit that’s more predatory.
3 Likes
Agreed; Thinking Out Loud could never be mistaken for Let’s Get It On, nor does it diminish the latter in any way.
6 Likes
4 Likes
11 Likes
“4 Chords” by Axis of Awesome
6 Likes
Man I miss Glove and Boots…
I didn’t pay much attention to the chords but the back beats, the timing of the snare and drum, sound identical, like Ice Ice Baby and Under Pressure. That’s where I’d say there is infringement. The chords? Meh.
4 Likes
And this is fun to play with:
1 Like
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
