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Eminem Sues Apple for Sampling his Samples
EvanKai writes "To celebrate Grey Tuesday, Eminem sues Apple to show his support for hiphop and sampling. CBS MarketWatch is reporting
that 'Rapper Eminem's music publisher is suing Apple Computer Inc., claiming the company used one of the hip-hop superstar's songs in a television advertisement without permission. Eight Mile Style filed the copyright infringement suit late last week against Apple, Viacom Inc., its MTV subsidiary and the TBWA/Chiat/Day advertising agency.' While the ad in question no longer appears, several similar ads can be found here. I can't believe Chiat Day failed to clear the use of these songs with Pink, Mariah Carey, and The Who... or whatever major label actually owns the rights."
Here's the text so you don't tax their servers too much.
Eminem sues Apple
By Tony Smith
Posted: 24/02/2004 at 16:07 GMT
The Register Mobile: Find out what the fuss is about. Take the two week trial today.
Eminem's publishing company has claimed Apple used one of his compositions in a TV ad without the the hip-hop star's "yo!"
And, according to Associated Press, the Mac maker is now facing a copyright infringement lawsuit, don'cha know.
Eminem's publisher, Eight Mile Style, filed the suit this past Friday.
Also named are MTV and Apple's ad agency, TBWA Chiat Day.
The song in question, "Lose Yourself", was rapped out by a ten-year-old in an iTunes Music Store commercial shown on MTV last summer.
"Lose Yourself" was the theme song to the movie Eight Mile, which starred Eminem and is based on his life story. The critics called it a "hummer".
Now after Eight Mile, you have to file, then it comes to trial, there's no denial.
"Eminem has never nationally endorsed any commercial products and... even if he were interested in endorsing a product, any endorsement deal would require a significant amount of money, possibly in excess of $10m," the lawsuit states, putting a figure on the kind of money it wants to get out of Apple and co.
Eight Mile Style appears to have attempted to negotiate a resolution, to the complaint with Apple, but those talks broke down with no solution.
The lawsuit claims Apple CEO Steve Jobs called Eight Mile Style chief Joel Martin and asked him to "rethink" the company's position.
Get Jobs on the blower, he says it's a no go-er, won't settle 'til Hell freezes over.
At the time of writing, dozens of Eminem songs were available for download from iTunes Music Store. (R)
Maybe the MARS company should sue Eminem (M&M) for copyright infingement.
Anybody want a Peanut?
How the fcuk is this insightful? Do yo know what Fair Use is? Apprently not or you would know this was clearly NOT fair use. This was commercial use of intellectual property plain and simple. Apple needed to secure a license with the publishing company (this is a re-recording of the song not playing the original sound recording afte rall) to use the words in such a manner. Commercial use of intellectual property does not allow for excerpts or derivatives, period. In fact, there is no fair use provisions for commercial use of intellectual property at all. It's for this reason alone that Copyright Law MUST remain intact or commercial interests will use any damn thing they want without regrad for the artists feeelings or opinions.
There is no such thing as fair use in advertising. When examining if a case is fair use, there are 4 main guidelines.
1 07.html
Purpose and character of the use (If you're trying to use it to make money or just teach)
The nature of the work
Amount of the work used
Effect fair use would cause on the market
Of significant interest is the first. Fair use is for things such as news reports (So they could show the Superbowl 1/2 time show without paying), and education (Reproduce a portion of Moby Dick for examples of metaphor).
Of other interest is the last. Many musicians stand to make quite a bit of money off of lending their music for ads (Crystal Method has made a killing doing this). So claiming "fair use" and having people use the song on any ad would destroy the potential commercial market for that song.
Oh yeah, FYI: IANAL but I anal... Check it for yourself:
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/
~D
This sig has been enciphered with a one-time pad. It could say almost anything.
I can not believe my eyes here. When we have an RIAA artical you people come out of the woodwork about how we have to respect copyrights and such yet some rapper that you do not like tries to protect his and all you do is flame.
GIVE ME A BREAK, if eminem owns the copyright to this song then guess what? He deserves his money. end of story.