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JibJab Sues for Fair Use of Right to Parody
An anonymous reader writes "A few days ago, Slashdot mentioned that JibJab was threatened by a copyright lawsuit. Well, it looks like JibJab decided to sue first with the help of the EFF. Lots more info here." (Here's the Bloomberg News article.) Update: 07/31 20:43 GMT by T : Seth Finkelstein has posted the court info on his website.
Its really about dubya trying to hide anything that shows what a dumbass he is. It's repression of free speech under the guise of an IP squabble.
As a Republican, I'm afraid I missed the Right Wing Conspiracy meeting on this one.
I think this case is a prime example of how copyright terms have grown out of control. Woody Guthrie wrote the song almost 3/4 of a century ago and has been dead for over 35 years. The fact that this song is still covered by a copyright is absolutely ridiculous. And the kicker is, it's owned by a company that has nothing to do with Woody Guthrie or any of his descendants!
I'd love to say "Rah rah, Bush Sucks," here, but it's not like the Republicans hold some sort of monopoly on bad IP law. Who was president when the DMCA went through? How about the "Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act" that protected artists by giving the Disney Corporation intellectual control over Steamboat Willy until we're all dead and buried?
This is not about politics. Someone wants to settle for half of some web site's T-Shirt sales and make a quick buck, because it's cheaper to hire a lawyer than it is to generate a Woody Guthrie Revivalist Movement.
I thought political humor was supposed to be funny. Your link is just a rabid attack that although it has a few logical points mostly misrepresents the issues (when it isn't launching on an ad hominem attack that is).
The parent post is only tangentially on topic in the sense that it's about politics. This Land was funny because it poked at both candidates; the parent's link is just spiteful.
I'd like to know what Arlo Guthrie, Woody Guthrie's son, would have to say about this case.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
Your post brings up an interesting question. Is setting up a site so that people can donate to your cause make it a commerical purpose?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but when a presidential candidate is campaigning and receives a donation, nobody considers that as a commercial purpose. But is it any different when it comes to a parody or a satire?
Dog for sale: eats anything and is fond of children
Who cares anyway? Just put the damn flash file up on Freenet and the problem is solved. The message gets out and there's nobody to sue. Fuck the government's idiotic regulations. This is exactly why we have Freenet.
My other car is first.
Excellent link. Thanks alot. Did you follow to read what Martin and Ernest had to say? I side with Ernest on this.
While jibjab definetly incorporates political satire, the thing that makes it so funny and such genius(IMO) is that it is also making fun of the original song. That is clearly being done in my opinion. They took a song about seeing our country in an unselfish way and made it a song about seeing the country in a selfish way. That it happens to incorporate political satire at the same time, IMO, does not take away from the parody of the original.
But again, I'm not a lawyer. Just my opinion.
Think for yourself, destroy your television.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
I disagree. There is definetly satire involved, but it is also parodying the original song. The message of the original song was one of viewing things in a non-self centered way. Their parody is about viewing it in a very self centered way. Parody and satire are not mutually exclusive.
Think for yourself, destroy your television.
We should probably also note the nice irony that the original version of "This Land is Your Land" was a strongly anti-private-property song, and we now have people trying to block a parody that Woodie Guthrie would have loved by claiming that the song is their own private property.
...
Of course, several of Woodie's original verses are very rarely heard these days, as people try hard to pervert it into a feel-good patriotic dittie. This is aided by the propensity of most people to learn only the first and sometimes second verses of songs.
Now we will segue into another long thread on the meaning of the term "irony"
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
When you said this, you reminded me of an earlier version of a parody of that song:
This land is their land,
It isn't our land,
From the Wall Street office
To the Cadillac car-land;
From the plush apartments
To the Hollywood starland,
This land is not for you and me.
If this is our land,
You'd never know it,
So take your bullshit
And kindly stow it,
Let's get together
And overthrow it,
Then this land will be for you and me.
Think for yourself, destroy your television.
Funny - I don't remember ol' Woody singing the words "U.N. Pussy" or "Right-wing Nut Job" in any of his performances, nor does it appear to be in the copyrighted text of the lyrics.
So the copyright violation is what, exactly?
This is clearly a parody of a song used in satire.
I hope they can get punitive damages in their preemptive suit.
Second, the federal court made it clear in that case that "parody" and "satire" were not two discrete categories that did not overlap. Someone else quoted the decision itself -- the essence is that it is possible to make fun of the work as well as make fun of something outside the work (in this case, the election). In the jib jab case I think it's obvious the artist is doing both. Also, the very rationale for the distinction -- that the artist must actually have some reason to use this particular work to make his or her point rather than just picking it at random -- is clearly met in the jibjab case. The artist is making a comment about what is said in the lyrics when he or she changes them. I think bloggers have turned this into a more ironclad distinction than the decision merits.
Also, a lot of slashdotters and apparently bloggers seem to think that the reason for the distinction is to protect an artist's right to make fun of another artist's work. It is not. The reason is to protect an artist's right to make a point. Insofar as the work in question is an essential part of that point, it is protected speech.
Look at the 2LiveCrew case (which is Supreme Court precedent) -- the band didn't make a song making fun of Roy Orbison; they made a song making fun of a pretty woman. To make this point it was essential to use the lyrics of the song. Where Orbison had created a certain notion of the pretty woman, the 2livecrew created a different notion, and the contrast between the new song and the old song was very much part of their point. One can easily say the same about this land is your land.
Finally I would add that I think this whole distinction is specious. The First Amendment does not protect your right to make a point in the most effective way possible; it protects your right to make a point. In this particular case the point being made is core political speech, which would give it even more protection. There is a first amendment defense in copyright cases quite apart from the definition of fair use and I think this would be a strong use of one.
"A parody that more loosely targets an original than the parody presented here may still be sufficiently aimed at an original work to come within our analysis of parody. if a parody whose wide dissemination in the market runs the risk of serving as a substitute for the original..., it is more incumbent on one claiming fair use to the original. By contrast, when there is little or no risk of market substitution, whether because of the large extent of transformation of the earlier work, the new work's minimal distribution in the market, the extent to which it borrows from the original, or other factors, taking parodic aim at an original is a less critical factor in the analysis, and looser forms of parody may be found to be fair use..."
In other words, the Supreme Court does not at all indicate that just because "parody" is protected, somehow "satire" is not. In the above, the issue is the risk of market substitution -- if people start watching jib jab instead of listening to Guthrie, they might have a case. Frankly, I think this really renders the federal decision in the Seuss case especially problematic.
Bottom line: the purpose of letting copyright holder's sue when others use their works is to protect the copyright holder's right to reap the fruits of their labor. It is not to give the copyright holder veto power over messages they don't like.
Putting it up on Freenet does NOT solve the problem the same way shooting a malnourished kid doesn't solve starvation. You don't solve the underlying issue.
The point is, we shouldn't *HAVE* to use freenet!
Never understimate the power of human stupidity -Lazarus Long
I hope the EFF takes this opportunity to challenge the constitutionality of the copyright law as "amended" by Disney, et. al.
... end of rant ...)
All the constitution says about what we call copyright and patents is: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
Seems to me that "limited Times" has been greatly exceeded and thus the current law is unconstitutional because "To promote the Progress of Science and the useful Arts" has effectively become to "promote the profits of large corporate copyright holders forever", which is certainly not what the founding fathers had in mind.
It also seems the current asymmetry of the law between what constitutes "limited Times" for a patent vs. a copyright make one or the other invalid. Either patents should last 100+ years or copyrights should go back to a term closer to patents (about one human "generation" (roughly 20 years) which seems more like the balance the founding fathers sought to strike between freedom to build on others works, and allowing the author/inventor to make a living and thus encourage people to write and invent).
It would be nice if the courts would quit reading their own precedents for a while and go back and read the straightforward language of the constitution. I don't think any of the judges or lawmakers that have created the current IP mess are in the same league as our founding fathers who worked hard to strike a balance that made sense and worked well for over 150 years. (... sorry
Locking up ideas as property, whether works of art or in any other form, is ultimately no different than suppressing them. If JibJab doesn't have the right to keep this video on their servers, then they don't have freedom of speech, and guess what? Neither do we.
The purpose of copyright was to prevent plagarists from passing off other people's work as their own for profit, not to censor similar expressions of ideas. It seems to me that a plagarist trying to pass off other people's works as their own (i.e. Woody Guthrie's) for profit is a perfect description of Ludlow Music.
I propose that those wishing to possess "intellectual property" should keep their thoughts in their head.
How ya like dat?
and you can have parody which is not satirical (EG any Wierd Al song).
I would like to point out that Weird Al pretty much does all three. Song's like Eat It and Yoda quite clearly are parodies, since his lyrics are completely unrelated to the originals. Some of his original songs, like Germs and Dare to be Stupid, satirize a particular musical style. However, songs like Achy Breaky Song and Smells Like Nirvana both satirize the very songs they are parodying.
Of course, discussing satire vs. parody in regards to Weird Al would get a good deal more complicated when you bring in his videos. Suddenly you have a video of a parody that satirizes the original song's video. Pretty much ends discussion of Weird Al as a one way artist.
(My favorite Weird Al song that blurs the line is Theme from Rocky XIII. Set to Eye of the Tiger it insinuates that Rocky is retired and running a deli. Brilliant!)
R: That voice. Where have I heard that voice before? B: In about 365 other episodes. But I don't know who it is either.