LawClanger Link

[major_clanger]

The Sound of Silence - could the Royal British Legion be sued by the estate of John Cage?

Comments

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

:)

I know unfortunately too little about copyright law to know what's legal. Common sensicly, if they say right on the packet that that segment was copied from John Cage, then they owe him royalties, and if you can tell by examining the encoding of the sound that segment was copied from John Cage, then they owe him royalties, or if the segment is obviously inspired by Cage from the context, then they owe him royalties, and if it has a completely different artistic value that just by coincidence shares some similarities, then they DON'T owe him royalties.

The difference with a normal work, is you can't easily tell if it's copied by comparing the contents, whereas you normally can, and it's disproportionately more likely that something WILL be very similar, just by coincidence.

I guess -- though I have no idea -- the same applies in the law. What I don't know is if two things that are similar by coincidence should be prevented, legally, or morally. (I think "no" but I don't know for sure.)

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I can't see any way the estate of John Cage would come out of this without looking like rapacious gits. Which is why I suspect it won't happen.

[pwilkinson.livejournal.com]

Isn't the RBL recording one of a work that's been performed regularly and widely since about 1919 (rather before the composition of 4'33")? Even though that almost certainly doesn't provide grounds for suing the Cage estate, isn't there anything similar to prior art when it comes to copyright?

[uitlander]

Surely 'prior art' applies in the case of silence? Or at least any silence that is not exactly 4 minutes and 33 seconds long in a performance context?

[feorag.livejournal.com]

There was a case a few years ago where Cage's record company successfully sued someone who joked that the silent patches on his record were sampled from 4' 33".