Artists, PK Support 'Blurred Lines' Infringement Appeal to 9th Circuit
Members of Fall Out Boy, Linkin Park and singer Jennifer Hudson are among 212 musicians jointly urging (in Pacer) the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit to overturn a 2015 jury verdict in U.S. District Court in Los…
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Angeles that said “Blurred Lines” co-writers Robin Thicke, T.I. and Pharrell Williams infringed Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up." The Los Angeles jury determined (in Pacer) that infringement of Gaye’s copyright wasn’t willful but the “Blurred Lines” co-writers faced $5.3 million in damages. Public Knowledge backed the “Blurred Lines” supporters in an amicus brief also filed Tuesday. Gaye's family believes the Los Angeles jury’s verdict and District Judge John Kronstadt's confirmation of it “sit on unshakable footing," emailed family lawyer Paul Philips. “Got to Give It Up” was written before provisions in the 1976 Copyright Act protected sound recordings, musicologists said (in Pacer). PK said the borrowing and adaptation of existing works “takes on a particular importance” in music. “Greater similarity among musical works is to be expected simply due to the ordinary structures of Western music,” the group wrote (in Pacer). “Copyright has long been understood to be premised on a utilitarian justification, that the monopoly right to exclude copying is granted in service of encouraging creation and dissemination of new works. Consequently, the scope of that monopoly right must be limited to avoid interference with downstream creators who build upon the works of the past.”