Copyright & Media Update

June 24, 2016

Led Zepplin Win in “Stairway to Heaven” Trial

BY KORY GROW: Led Zeppelin have won a copyright lawsuit that claimed they had plagiarized the music to their most celebrated song, “Stairway to Heaven.” A Los Angeles jury determined Thursday that the lawyer representing the estate of late guitarist Randy Wolfe, who played with the group Spirit, did not prove that the hard rockers lifted the song’s intro from Spirit’s 1968 instrumental “Taurus.” READ MORE…

Sustainability and the Future of Music

BY VICKIE NAUMAN: Over the last 15 years, digital music has journeyed along an unpaved road, wending its way into our new connected world using the tools and assumptions of yesteryear. The old/new business constructs have vastly different distribution mechanisms, container sizes, business models, ecosystems, and consumer expectations – but the core around which the industry is built, great music and appreciative fans, remains largely the same. READ MORE…

Capitol Records V. Vimeo: Coddling Bad Actors in Copyright Cases

BY DEVIN HARTLINE:Just how much knowledge about piracy on its system does an online service provider need before it loses its safe harbor protection, which severely limits its potential liability for copyright infringement, under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)? In Capitol Records v. Vimeo, the Second Circuit sets the bar very high, further blurring one of most important lines in copyright law—the line between actual and red flag knowledge—and protecting a not-so-innocent service provider in the process. READ MORE…

TVEyes v. Fox Huge Deal for Copyrights

BY DAVID NEWHOFF: One of the most important copyright cases in the country landed at the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in December of 2015. Appellants TVEyes and Fox News Network filed opening briefs, each seeking new rulings after the Court for the Southern District of New York held a split decision last year that satisfied neither party. In July of 2013, Fox sued TVEyes—a B2B, subscription-based, news-monitoring service that records, stores, and indexes 1,400 channels—for copyright infringement of its programs. READ MORE…

More Brits Buy CDs Than Pay for Streaming Services

BY CHARLOTTE HASSAN: Transitions sometimes take time. According to research conducted by Kantar Worldpanel Entertainment, only 14% of people in the UK actually pay for a music streaming service. A survey population of 15,000 were sampled, and of the people that participated, 62% of the 14% of people who claimed that they did pay to stream music were using Spotify (do that math in your head.) READ MORE…

But the really interesting part of the study was that more people (23%) said that they actually still paid for CDs.

About Christian Copyright Solutions: CCS’s quest is to help churches and Christian ministries “do music right.” CCS is an expert on church music copyrights and our primary focus is providing licensing and clear educational resources to churches, as well as representation, administration and advocacy for copyright owners. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Youtube. The information contained herein is for informational purposes only, and is not legal advice or a substitute for legal counsel.