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The Country music duo the "Bellamy Brothers" are upset over Britney song title's resemblance to their 1979 hit but it seem they will not be suing the popstar.

I know that the Bellamy Brothers specifically mention the title, but I think they would have a much stronger case on the basis of "fixing" the double entendre within the song: the BB's lyrics are "If I said you had a beautiful body / would you hold it against me" vs. Britney's "If I said I want your body now / would you hold it against me." That's pretty startlingly similar, and even if you can't copyright ideas, you can copyright the expression of those ideas... and there's enough overlap between the two to be persuasive.

Now that I know copying a song title doesn't count as copyright infringement, I wonder what percentage of a songs lyrics must be exactly the same as another song in order for that to count as copyright infringement. And even if the lyrics happen to be the same, can an artist still avoid a lawsuit if his or her melodic line/ chordal progression/ instrumentation is different enough to make the song "original"? I'm guessing that its a case-by-case thing...

Another rebuttal of Turow's Op-Ed from the Times.

The A.P. and artist, Mr. Shepard Fairey settled on sharing the copyright to the famous photograph of Obama that became the iconic HOPE portrait of the then-presidential candidate. The amount of financial compensation agreed upon has not been disclosed, though in the future, their deal will apply to proceeds coming from any posters or other merchandise sold with the image. Originally, the A.P. sued in February 2009 for copyright infringement, but Mr. Fairey counter-sued, arguing that the HOPE image fell under the fair-use exception to copyright law. As our class has read thus far, regarding the exceptions of parodies to copyright law because of their transformative nature and in turn become a creative work wholly different from the original, the A.P.'s photograph was used in a similar capacity. The artist claimed "that he had effectively transformed the work into an idealized image 'that created powerful new meaning and conveys a radically different message.'"

According to the Washington Post, although the case has been settled with Fairey, the Associated Press intends to go to trial in March with Obey Clothing, a clothing line selling apparel with the Obama image. Another apparel manufacturer, One 3 Two, on the other hand, settled because they did not want to give the appearance that their primary goal was to make a profit. In fact, One 3 Two initially began selling the t-shirt to retailers, such as Urban Outfitters, to ultimately raise funds for Obama's campaign. Do you think that the A.P. had the right to sue over this photograph? Why or why not?

The web radio service's filings show that over half of its revenue (approximately $45 million) was used to pay copyright owners, an amount so high that it expects to have a virtually non-existent profit margin through to 2012. Though the company has grown in the past year and copyright fee expenditures don't represent as large a chunk of the earnings as last year (when it was 60%), concern remains over its ability to make ends meet. Royalty payments are principally made to: SoundExchange (which receive 45 of Pandora's revenue alone), BMI, ASCAP, and SESAC. The company is also looking to "go global" but has encountered problems, as its business model is based on US copyright laws. 

this film really puts forth some interesting thoughts and ideas about copyright law and its validity in today's cultural marketplace.

Should Google have to pay for its content on Google News?

This is the article I have chosen to improve for our assignment. I may narrow my topic to US Copyright Law in Theatre if the Performing Arts topic seems too broad.

Viacom is maintaining its 2007 billion dollar lawsuit against Google (as it acquired YouTube in 2006), despite the latter continuous fervent denial. Though "Google argues that when YouTube promptly took down tens of thousands of videos after Viacom gave it notice, YouTube was within provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act." Viacom is stating that the infringement is taking the form of violating the 1998 Copyright Act. Which holds both content owners and systems operators responsible for the protection of copyrighted content online. After reading this article, a few questions come to mind: What can Google do to appease and keep the "integrity" of YouTube? and Isn't it interesting that Viacom only filed this $1 billion lawsuit AFTER Google had acquired YouTube? What can we say about interested parties possibly abusing copyright law?

Righthave "wrong" on fair use!!

More Righthaven trolling.

McLeod's full article in THE ATLANTIC.  Amazing, great stuff about sampling.

well, this sounds familiar.

Though this video is interesting, the comment thread gives a great look at people's thoughts on current copyright laws.