Recently, a company called Lost International filed a lawsuit against Stephanie Joanne Angelina Germanotta, better known as Lady Gaga*, alleging that she had, with “blatant disregard,” copied their intellectual property. Here, we’ll examine the lawsuit, the underlying IP law, and venture some
Tag: copyright
You probably know Jason Vorhees, the hockeymask-wearing, machete-wielding villain of the Friday the 13th franchise. He’s been terrifying audiences for over forty years now. But perhaps the most scary thing Jason has done recently is win $886,564.88 in attorney’s fees for his
How did we ever lose communication? How did we ever lose each other’s sound? Baby, if you wanna, we can fix the situation Maybe we can stop the rain from coming down [1] It’s rare that song lyrics effectively summarize the
By now you’ve probably heard the story about how leaders of The Door Christian Fellowship McAllen Church in McAllen, Texas thought that Hamilton [1] , a much-admired and long-running Broadway musical that has won, among other awards, 11 Tonys, a Grammy, and
Back in 2017, the group 3LW sued Taylor Swift, alleging that her 2014 song, “Shake It Off,” plagiarized lyrics from their 2001 song, “Playas Gon Play.” Specifically, 3LW points to the similarity between their lyric: “Playas, they gonna play / And haters,
In January 2024, Mickey Mouse will enter the public domain. That’s when Disney’s copyright on the character expires, and he legally becomes public property. That means that creative people can do what they like with him, and not be subject to the
“A copyright license isn’t forever, and can be taken back by the original artist (or their estate) after 35 years.” TOP copyright: Maverick I don’t have a lot of details on this, because it’s happening right now, but here’s the gist: Back