Guide Through the Legal Jungle: Court Decision about Songs ...

Copyright Does Not Protect Everything

For example, copyright law does not protect raw ideas. It only protects the way in which those ideas are expressed or developed. Unfortunately, separating the ?idea? from the ?expression of the idea? is often subjective and not necessarily intuitive. That?s why it?s helpful to have real life examples like the recent decision in the PI music copyright infringement lawsuit.

Musicians Slinging Pi

Pi is a mathematical constant that is the ratio of a circle?s circumference to its diameter. The first six numbers of pi are 3.14159. Composers Michael Blake and Lars Erickson independently assigned a number to each note of a musical scale and then constructed a melody by playing the notes in the order of the digits of pi.

Composer Michael Blake published on YouTube and elsewhere a recorded composition entitled ?What Pi Sounds Like?. Erikson, who had previously created a composition entitled ?Pi Symphony?, sued Blake for copyright infringement.

The Court Finds No Infringement

The court dismissed the lawsuit finding that both composers had simply created a composition based on the same idea. The idea was transcripting pi to music. There is no copyright infringement just because one composer uses the ideas of another composer. Infringement exists only if one composer copies the manner in which another composer expresses the idea and the two compositions end up being identical or substantially similar. For Blake and Erikson, the court found that the two pi compositions differed distinctly in areas such as rhythm, tempo, musical phrasing, and harmony.

Copyright also recognizes that for some ideas ? such as the idea of putting pi to music ? there are a limited number of ways in which to implement or express that idea. As a result, expressions of that particular idea ? even if created completely independently from one another ? may share some basic similarities.

Listen for Yourself

You can listen to both pi compositions yourself to determine how similar and distinct they are. Michael Blake?s ?What Pi Sounds Like? is here. You can listen to movements from Lars Erikson?s ?Pi Symphony? here and here.

Source: http://www.guidethroughthelegaljungleblog.com/2012/03/court-decision-about-songs-based-on-pi-illustrates-what-is-and-isnt-copyrightable.html

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