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Led Zeppelin have triumphed in a long-running copyright dispute after a US appeals court ruled they did not steal the opening riff in Stairway To Heaven.
The British rock legends were accused in 2014 of ripping off a song called Taurus by the US band Spirit.
Taurus was written in 1968, three years before Stairway To Heaven.
Now, the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco has upheld a 2016 trial verdict that found Led Zeppelin did not copy it.
https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-51805905
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Appeals Court Rules Led Zeppelin Did Not Steal Stairway to Heaven Riff
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To be a kind of moral Unix, he touched the hem of Nature's shift.
-- Shelley
(Score: 5, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday March 10 2020, @03:42AM (44 children)
My view on this is that there should be a statute of limitations. If you can't be bothered to protect your copyright for many decades after you become aware of the violation and/or the violation became extremely profitable, then the judges should simply throw out the case and not even bother with the question of whether it's been violated or not.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 10 2020, @03:44AM (34 children)
That'd require you to police all works produced in similar media, which just is not humanly possible. Now when it's a massively famous work like Stairway to Heaven, then you have a point.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:17AM (10 children)
There's a reason they waited this long: the person/people in Spirit who owned the original copyright died, and the unproductive leeches who inherited their estate decided to try to capitalize on it.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Snotnose on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:30AM (9 children)
See also Ono, Yoko. I remember reading a month or two back where she wouldn't give Sean the letters he'd written his dad, he had to buy them from her at auction.
Talk about a talentless fuck skating along on someone else's work, that would be her.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:40AM
Well to be fair.... he wasn't exactly paying with his own money was he.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:44AM
When he was told did he exclaim "Yoko oh no!"
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:51AM (1 child)
Give Ireland back to the Irish
Give Lapland back to the Laps
Give China back to the Chinese
And give Yoko back to the Japs
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday March 10 2020, @01:59PM
Yoko Ono: the Japanese Celine Dion... their home countries DON'T WANT THEM BACK!
Justin Beeber, neither.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday March 10 2020, @09:58AM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday March 10 2020, @01:57PM (3 children)
Where's the Amen mod?
She put out a song (heard it a long time ago) where she says (not sings) "What am i going to do about my.........legs?" I thought, "Wha?"
FOUND IT!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1COlh7233Yw [youtube.com]
And NOW for something COMPLETELY DIFFERENT!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdZ9weP5i68 [youtube.com]
Talentless is kind...
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Tuesday March 10 2020, @09:57PM (2 children)
You deserve 30 lashes with a cat o' nine tails just for linking to that audio terrorism.....
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday March 10 2020, @11:21PM (1 child)
Tha's it: keep talking dirty to me...! :)
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Thursday March 12 2020, @10:55AM
Oh my, you're such a tease! ;)
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DannyB on Tuesday March 10 2020, @02:46PM (14 children)
Funny how copyright maximalists expect it to be everyone else's job to police their works for copyright infringement.
If you don't become aware of a similar song or chord progression on a popular song for many years, then I have to wonder whether it should even qualify as a copyright infringement. I could maybe have a bit more sympathy if someone discovered some obscure little known song to have infringed their copyright -- but then I would have to ask if that song had in any way damaged the market value of what is allegedly infringed upon.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 10 2020, @03:22PM (13 children)
False dichotomy. Nobody has to police it. Even the assertion that someone should have to listen to every new song produced in the world or forfeit their right to sue on any they didn't is ludicrous.
That's because you refuse to understand the utility of copyright at all. Yes, the current duration is so absurdly long that it should be overturned by SCOTUS as being functionally eternal but how it started out in the US was a fairly reasonable compromise. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water just because you're pissed off.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday March 10 2020, @03:49PM (9 children)
At this point it really *would* be better to just revoke all copyright laws. That's a sorrowful statement, because copyright *should* serve a useful purpose, and for a long time it did, but the way things are now we'd be better off without any. If you could just revert to a term of 17 years with one extension I'd say "Well, OK" but with rapid communication and cheap publication I think even that's too long.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:01PM (8 children)
No, no it would not. Much like it wouldn't be a good thing to shut off all coal/nuclear power without anything to immediately replace it. Being pissed off, righteously or not, does not turn unwise into wise.
I'd say seven years with an option on a seven year extension (for most things) if you're willing to pay 25% of your gross as a fee during that second seven years.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday March 10 2020, @05:07PM (5 children)
I'd like to share that advice with Trump supporters. Or even Trump himself.
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(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday March 12 2020, @03:14AM (4 children)
Man, that needs to be a bumper sticker. No, it needs to be on every license plate.
Trump was still the wiser choice though if you're not into having a shadow government that gives not a fuck what the people who voted them in wanted. And versus either Biden or Bernie a literal clown from an actual circus would even be wiser.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday March 12 2020, @03:06PM (3 children)
In some sense we got a clown.
The sad thing is that these are the candidates that 'float' to the top?
But especially Trump. If Trumpers were unhappy with Hillary (which I understand) could they, collectively as a party, not come up with a better candidate than Trump? I didn't like GWB but I at least had some respect for him and thought he was basically honorable if a bit dim witted. But Trump? That vulgar obscenity? How is it those people picked that, and continue to support him? It boggles the mind. And further brings more division. The pendulum always swings back and forth, but some people don't seem to think that far ahead. Or about rules and lines not to cross, because they might not like the same rules and dirty tricks when the shoe is on the other foot. But no. Nobody seems to think that far ahead.
I hate to see what is coming no matter who gets elected.
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(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday March 13 2020, @11:04AM (2 children)
Yeah, that's why I was specific as to it being a proper clown.
Nah, he was the one closest to what they wanted and by primaries time it's too late to organize a campaign because all of the choices suck. In case you're not quite clear on what they wanted, they wanted a middle finger to the political establishment, business as usual, and politicians on the right who apologize for not being politically correct enough when the left defines political correctness.
Now there were lots of other issues-related reasons but those are the ones that were pretty well universal to all his voters and why him instead of anyone else who ran in the primaries.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday March 13 2020, @05:55PM (1 child)
I was, but am no longer happy with the Democratic candidates. I guess the worst really do float to the top. Brace yourself, no matter what happens.
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(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday March 13 2020, @10:27PM
What for? I mean, it's just gonna be four more years of the same and Trump ain't fucked anything up any worse than any other President in the first four.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday March 10 2020, @09:53PM (1 child)
I would further that and say that only the actual creators should ever be able to own a copyright. No being forced to give up your copyright just to get a recording contract or such. They can lease distribution to another party for the first seven years, but after that term is up all rights go back to the creators and another lease must be contracted for the second seven years.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday March 12 2020, @03:16AM
Disallow exclusive deals (the kind that prohibit you from dealing with anyone else rather than the kind where you don't want to deal with anyone else) and that goes right away. And you get more competition. Yay competition!
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Tuesday March 10 2020, @03:56PM (2 children)
What is that fairly reasonable compromise? If you don't mind me asking.
I'm under the impression that copyright originally (maybe predating the US) was to protect cartographers.
It seems we might agree that whatever reasonable balance copyright might have once had in the US, that balance has been completely upended by, first the music industry, and then the motion picture industry.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:02PM
Truth. See slightly above.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by dry on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:37PM
While copyright was first used to protect the stationers guild and for censorship after the invention of printing, the first modern copyright act had it right in its long title,
And even then the publishers were arguing it was for the artists while ripping them off.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 11 2020, @04:15AM (7 children)
Indeed.
Why? It wouldn't require policing of "all works produced in similar media" to discover that Led Zepplin was playing other peoples' songs. It'd just require a timely response. The dude who came up with the earlier work allegedly knew of the plagiarism from some point in the 1980s (I dimly recall he allegedly complained about the alleged plagiarism at that time), and probably knew of it almost instantly from 1971, given Led Zepplin's popularity. So why in that light did a lawsuit finally surface in 2014?
My point is that knowledge of the alleged violation happened long before the lawsuit did, and that the violation was very material with huge sales. That should by itself be enough to throw out the lawsuit. Sue them in a timely manner or GTFO.
The terms of copyright, particularly, their duration, are already absolutely ridiculous in their burden on society. There's no need to make it worse by allowing for lawsuits many decades after the plaintiff gets standing to sue. Keep in mind that US copyright on music is presently good for life plus 75 years. The song that Led Zeppelin was accused of infringing was written by a Randy Palmer who died in 1997. Technically, that means that his estate could sue through to 2072 long past the deaths of anyone involved with any alleged violations.
While a couple of posters have proposed ending copyrights altogether (which in my view is better than the current regime - yes, I think it better to have nothing at all than copyrights that will greatly outlive me), we don't need to go that far to merely eliminate vexatious lawsuits submitted decades later than any reasonable limit.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday March 12 2020, @03:11AM (6 children)
Yes, it absolutely would require listening to every bit of audio recorded after your wonderful creation was released to ensure that your copyright was not violated. That is part of why lawsuits are allowed to happen way after the infringement. The burden is on the copyright holder and they have no real way except word of mouth, random chance, or the infringing work becoming insanely popular to even find out if their rights have been infringed.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday March 12 2020, @05:00PM (5 children)
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday March 13 2020, @10:45AM (4 children)
Duh. You're making blanket policy statements though not specific-to-this-case arguments. And your blanket policy statements are flat out wrong for the reasons I've already put forward and many more.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 13 2020, @12:23PM (3 children)
And I'm quite comfortable with making those policy statements since that actually is the policy. Keep in mind the phrase that I used in the beginning, "statute of limitations". Most crimes and virtually every civil case in the US follows statutes of limitations that are well under 43 years. And it turns out that copyright also has a statute of limitations of three years [forbes.com].
My view is to extend that. If someone has been aware of a violation for decades and done nothing, that should revoke their right to enforce their copyright over the violation - particularly in light of the ridiculous length of copyright.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday March 13 2020, @02:28PM (2 children)
And your view is incorrect. It's slapping idiotic rules on top of idiotic rules in an attempt to mitigate the idiocy. The proper solution is to remove the idiocy not mitigate it.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 14 2020, @12:55PM (1 child)
Idiocy mitigation need not be idiotic. Sometimes you can't implement proper solutions - after all the idiocy wouldn't exist in the first place, if it was easy to remove.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday March 14 2020, @01:41PM
Yeah, no. I just ain't gonna get behind leaving idiocy in place. And I'm certainly not going to get behind piling more idiocy on top of it to make it even harder to remove. You don't wrap duct tape around a leaking water pipe, you fix the fucking pipe. You're not even advocating duct tape, you're advocating toilet paper.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by crafoo on Tuesday March 10 2020, @11:51AM (8 children)
As long as we live in the world of absolutely ridiculous and unethical lengths of copyright PROTECTION for the artists, their families, and the great-grand children of the board of directors of the company that bought the rights .. they should be required to protect them in court for as well.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday March 10 2020, @03:22PM (7 children)
Two stupids don't make a smart.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by crafoo on Wednesday March 11 2020, @06:24PM
Sure, who would disagree with that? I wasn't claiming it was right, just that they should reap the consequences of the system they support when it benefits them.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 13 2020, @12:23PM (5 children)
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday March 13 2020, @02:16PM (4 children)
Mainly? That it's not humanly possible to police every sound recording made after your wonderful creation to ensure no violation has occurred. If it's not possible, it's absurd to require.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 14 2020, @12:54PM (3 children)
Why would you need to? In this story, that wasn't the problem. The copyright holders just need to police one thing in a timely manner. They waited 43 years instead.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday March 14 2020, @01:43PM (2 children)
So what? Time passing doesn't make wrong into right or vice versa.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 14 2020, @05:35PM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday March 14 2020, @09:55PM
Yeah, no, we effectively do not have a statute of limitations on copyright and haven't since the ability for anyone to easily copy any work came about. We have a very narrowly crafted limitation on it that is all but nonexistent because the clock is restarted every time a copy is made.
I've said it before but let me rephrase it, you do not fix idiotic laws by adding a frosting of retardation.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.