[baseten]

It's kind of ironic that Marvin is dead and his particular brand of art is no longer progressing. He is silent on the matter and his estate brought the suit.

Ultimately anybody can bring a suit against anybody and this suit wouldn't even be a thing if that dumb blurred lines song wasn't a hit and there wasn't money to be made.

That also being said that song is a straight ripoff of Got to give it up. Everybody who was a fan of Marvin knew it instantly, but if you wrote out the score on a page and compared, the two songs wouldn't match up. Also if you objectively compared the audio files you wouldn't find any samples of the former song in the latter either. I thought they found a clever way around the copyright using the former track as inspiration. perhaps borrowing heavily, but if this is the precedent we really are headed toward a world where nobody can create something without paying a ransom to another copyright holder.

[2muchcoffeeman]

> * That also being said that song is a straight ripoff of Got to give it up. Everybody who was a fan of Marvin knew it instantly, but if you wrote out the score on a page and compared, the two songs wouldn't match up.*

As a fan of neither, I youtubed both songs when I heard about this ruling. If Blurred Lines is a rip off, then a lot of bands should be very worried.

How many times has someone told you "If you like X, you should listen to Y." I was listening to Triple J a couple days ago and a caller requested some song specifically because it reminded them of some other song. Pretty sure it was on Bridgette's program, but could have been Gen and Lewis[1].

[1]http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/programs/all-shows/

[lisper]

> that song is a straight ripoff

No, it's not. The two songs are not even remotely similar. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16669049

> if you wrote out the score on a page and compared, the two songs wouldn't match up

That's because they are not even remotely similar.

> if you objectively compared the audio files you wouldn't find any samples of the former song in the latter either

That's because they are not even remotely similar.

[syshum]

This is why copyright should end at death,

Actually copyright should be the 14 years + a one time extension of 14 years which can only be applied for by the living original creator

Copyrights by corporations are 14 years only, no extensions

[colejohnson66]

The problem with ending it at death is that it gives an incentive to kill the author if you want to rip off their work. The 14+14 (as it originally was) is what I think it should be.

[acjohnson55]

That doesn't seem like a real concern.

[gkya]

Copyright is a menace to the society. Authors should maybe have a right on their work similar to what 2-clause BSD licence gives: if you reuse or distribute this, mention me please. The complex web of influences on each word spoken and each gesture made, let aside artworks altogether, is so complex that a consistent and just enforcement of copyright is just impossible. It serves no other purpose than making some companies and some greedy agents like the suers here rich, exploiting artists worldwide.

[sitkack]

Combinatorily autogenerate every song ever, post them all to YouTube and let Google find out who to "monetize".