Timbaland Court Case starts on Wednesday

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

Update coming up!

Visitors to my initial blog-post so far today is closing in on 600 (!!!).

Blogosphere linking is about 15 so we have a minor blog-quake undertaken.

I have also engaged the international Pirate Parties:

http://www.pp-international.net/forum/v ... hp?t=25814

Cheers!

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

Just a brief notice but well worth mentioning considering the potential magnitude. Pirate captain himself, Rick Falkvinge, has joined our ranks in a small but symbolic way:

http://rickfalkvinge.se/2010/01/27/thom ... 80-64-4-0/

[Makke]

Excellent work, Thomas. Well written.

The more press this case gets the better.

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

Excellent work, Thomas. Well written.

The more press this case gets the better.

Tackar så mycket!

I fully agree! This shit needs to hit the fan. In a way it already has as I consider myself a fan of both 6R6 and the scene in general. Just prolonging the filth...

[Chris Abbott]

Well, actually, things are progressing legally too. The reason there's no news is because you don't give away all your information before the trial.

Chris

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

Interesting news Chris. I take it that you are not able to fill on details but I sensed a positive undertone nevertheless. *wheee*

[Chris Abbott]

Interesting news Chris. I take it that you are not able to fill on details but I sensed a positive undertone nevertheless. *wheee*

If things are as I think they are, he's toast.

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

Interesting news Chris. I take it that you are not able to fill on details but I sensed a positive undertone nevertheless. *wheee*

If things are as I think they are, he's toast.

Ouch!

Ok, that means additional motivation to keep spreading the word!

[Analog-X64]

There is a passing remark about Timbaland on the subject of plagiarism.

http://www.themercury.com.au/article/20 ... itude.html

I would imagine this would be impossible to prove, since it copys more the rhythm etc..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHHV69OuqSU

Here is an interesting note.
-- Music producers who have worked with Chrissy are also friends with Kesha's producer -- and those same producers have worked up a remix of Kesha's song.
-- Chrissy's "My Slushy" has been prominently featured on Redbana's "Dance Audition" site for over a year. Kesha's song appeared on the same site this past June.
-- Chrissy's songs have also been featured on Clear Channel's "Discover New Music" site, and Kesha's work also appeared on that site after Chrissy's.
-- Many of Chrissy's fans, upon first hearing the Kesha song, at first thought it was Chrissy they were hearing. (See blog comments from above link.)
-- "TiK ToK" also seems to have been influenced by other Chrissy songs, "Strut" and "Diddy Do Da" (both can be heard on Chrissy's MySpace, www.myspace.com/chrissyofficialtunes).



Sorry to get a bit off topic, but this sounds like a Cookie cutter situation. Use the same formula to churn out a song.

[Mark Wright]

This is so immensely frustrating.

I can remember, many years ago, how I joked with a friend of mine about "bringing chip tunes to the dance floor." It was around the time that Jon Dunn's Gameboy Robocop theme was being used on a UK TV commercial for Ariston washing machines (so, 1990?). We both had Amigas by then and were part of the demo scene, but we also had C64 heritage and recognised the tune, wondering if Jonathan had been commissioned or was unaware.

Based on that, I always thought it would be amusing if one day I heard a genuine C64 sample in a commercial track on the radio - i.e. an "in joke" that would surprise and entertain those who acknowledged the origin, but for others, they'd be oblivious. We both made various aborted club-style OctaMED efforts using C64 samples (Sanxion a favourite), realising the potential, but never progressing any further than several works-in-progress.

Fast forward to me receiving the pre-release MoS promo of Zombie Nation / Kernkraft 400, when I actually was working in radio many years later. I instantly recognised the DW (or JCB sample and cursed the fact that they'd got there first. Prior to this, I'd merely thought how "funny" it would be to hear something obscure (like a C64 composition) heard en masse in a commercial song (after all, I can't listen to Lionel Richie's "Running With The Night" without thinking: Cybernoid II) but I hadn't considered the copyright implications for the "geek" composer involved.

However, as I witnessed the track grow in popularity, and after it had reached #2 in the UK charts, I contacted The Sun newspaper's Bizarre column to point out that this track was based on "an ancient video game that probably none of your readers will remember, but the point is that this big hit record is basically theft" because I felt it was unjust. They were understandably incredulous, but promised they'd run something the next day.

Luckily, ZN's "theft" of DW's Lazy Jones track was rightly acknowledged thanks to Chris A, but with the Scooter incident (and others) I felt a bit sorry for the artists involved thinking they'd probably thought (like me) that they were somhow paying tribute to SID. Until Nelly Furtado's "Do It". And the clearly massively unjust situation with Timbaland. And the majors involved. And the unrelenting denials.

Quite why this wasn't an open-and-shut case is only something Chris and the band of lawyers know. It's so utterly wrong, but probably borne out of the "hey we're paying tribute" attitude I descirbed above. It's so utterly obviously that "Do It" contains the GRG track, recorded but slightly slowed down and separated (as any sample would be to fit in to a sequencer). There can surely be no doubt?

I sincerely hope this is settled shortly. I realise it's Tempest's compostion (which the Furtado song is so obviously woven around that Tempest deserves a writer credit) but GRG is due at least £10,000 publishing clearance (more? - obviously it would be straight-cut if he had a publisher to negotiate).

A happy AcidJazzed evening to y'all.

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

@Mark Wright: Your story made very interesting reading (despite from now on I wont be able to enjoy Cybernoid II without hearing "Running With the Night" in my head *sigh*)!

I agree it is a very frustrating matter seeing how the big honchos in the music biz seems to get away with everything not matter how obvious the truth is...

Anyone, sitting on more information on this matter that could add to what has already been said please comment here or contact me directly: http://address-protector.com/GqdC401HwS ... CzxVEjnGFQ

A summary of yesterday:
The blog-post regarding the injustice in regards to Gallefoss reached a whopping 831 visitors!

All in all I have noticed 20 links from the Swedish blogsphere including the following:
Rick Falkvinge, leader of Pirate Party
Anna Troberg, vice leader of Pirate Party
Emma Andersson, winner of last year's most prestigious blog award in Sweden

Cheers!

[Chris Abbott]

Interesting news Chris. I take it that you are not able to fill on details but I sensed a positive undertone nevertheless. *wheee*

If things are as I think they are, he's toast.

Ouch!

Ok, that means additional motivation to keep spreading the word!

when I say "he", I meant Timbaland, you got that right?

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

when I say "he", I meant Timbaland, you got that right?

Ever heard about "dumb swedes"? I am in that fellowship.

That is excellent news then and something I think I can expand a bit on! Is it ok if I quote your comments here or should I go by "rumours say"?

[Chris Abbott]

Um, "rumours say". I may already have said too much...

As mentioned, there are two court cases here: Lazy Jones/Zombie Nation and Timbaland. In both cases it's pretty much theft. With Lazy Jones, David sold (for quite a small amount) the right to legitimise their use of the tune, which they'd actually already stolen, and were claiming they'd already finished with.

However, that "licence" was then used by ZN to effectively steal the track from David, claim to be the author, and to have exclusive rights over the Lazy Jones track: something that the licence didn't allow him to do. The court case is in April, and at stake is who has the right to grant licences for commercial Lazy Jones remixes: which we think, obviously, should be the author.

If someone wants to really help, all the bloggers could buy Makke's "Lazy Jones" (from It's Binary Baby) or "Comic Bakery" from Project Galway and put it at the top of the charts (both are on iTunes and Amazon)

Chris

[thomastvivlarenDOTse]

Um, "rumours say". I may already have said too much...

I interpret it as we'd better not use that metainfo at all then. Would be pretty rotten if something initiated to support Gallefoss' case destroyed the chances of a positive outcome of whatever-is-undertaken-at-the-mo'.

Spinning on the underlining point that Matt Wright had, it would be in the interest of future similar cases to have it reach the court and have it work as a precedent. I fully understand if a settlement agreement is the way it will turn out in the end à la "better safe than sorry". I think it is important to remember though that especially the big four is under pressure in these days and a thing like this could be very costly in their regard and beyond this particular case. The implementation of the EU-directive Ipred is just one of those matters where the judicial system has been skewed (screwed!) to comply with the requests of the big four et al. In other words, would it turn out that they don't really walk their talk it would also add to the pressure on the politicians that agree to everything they claim.

Just mentioning this as something that perhaps could be used and be brought up before setting a potential deal.

Thanks for the other info! I will research that info and see what I can use.