A federal judge in Manhattan found Trump liable in the "Electric Avenue" copyright case, saying he offered no real defense for using the song.
  • some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
    0·
    2 months ago

    Grant had sued Trump in 2020, over a campaign tweet — a crudely-drawn, 55-second animation that showed then-presidential candidate Joe Biden feebly puttering along a railroad track in a push cart while a high-speed “Trump-Pence” train zoomed past.

    About 40 seconds of “Electric Avenue” plays as part of the soundtrack.

    How could you think you’d get away with this?

    The video was viewed more than 13.7 million times, was liked more than 350,000 times, and was retweeted more than 139,000 times, the judge wrote.

    Holy shit. You’re definitely not getting away with this.

    His strategy has been to outrun his legal issues until they fail or he dies. I really hope he sees the inside of a cell before he dies, but I’d also take him choking on lunch and dying right now. Prefer prison, though.

    • TachyonTele@lemm.ee
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      2 months ago

      He’ll never see the inside of a cell. He’s an ex president. He might be confined to his home, but I doubt even that.

      This world sucks.

  • phoneymouse@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Meh, as much as I hate Trump, I’m not a fan of the idea that someone could be sued for tweeting video with a song in it.

    • ByteJunk@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      If you mean “someone” as in an individual that is posting something they made that happens to contain the song, then I agree with you.

      But there are many other uses where there should be restrictions (and need to pay royalties/get licence), like here where it’s being used in a political campaign, or for commercial purposes, or if being posted by a corporation, etc.

    • 9point6@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      It’s not really the same when you’re talking about a campaigning politician.

      No one sane wants to be associated with Trump’s campaign, and him using the song is implying association.

    • Boddhisatva@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      You know who (apparently) didn’t get sued? The person who made the video and initially tweeted it. Because they probably took down their tweet when they got the cease and desist letter. Trump & Co. retweeted it commercially and refused to pay for it. They then got sued because they refused to take it down after getting the letter.

      If you find yourself as the recipient of a cease and desist letter because you used someone else’s creative work for your own profit, just don’t be an ass and take it down. Then you won’t get sued.

    • LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Wouldn’t that result in many musicians never getting paid for their work? Just upload high quality full audio clips to low resolution video unrelated and share with everyone. Everyone can strip the video and have the audio for free, making it a legal platform to upload the content for distribution. Downloading for non commercial gain used to be the grey area, where uploading was the illegal part I believe. At least that’s what I remember from torrents and seeding back in the day