Sampling Lawsuits Continue

As reported in a number of places, Drive-In Music has been bringing copyright infringement suits related to songs produced and distributed in the early 1990s. Overviews of the situation can be found at http://www.allhiphop.com/stories/news/archive/2010/09/13/22385540.aspx.

For the suit against Leaders of the New School, the conplaint can be found at
http://www.courthousenews.com/2010/09/07/HipHop.pdf.

The complaint in the case against Cypress Hill can be found at http://www.courthousenews.com/2010/09/13/Tunes.pdf.

What interests me in this case - and is probably interesting more generally - is Drive-In Music is claiming that they were not aware of the infringement for nearly 20 years. The statute of limitations in copyright infringement cases is three years from the date of the infringement. (See 17 U.S.C.A. sec 507). Recent cases about sampling disputes, such as Williams v. Curington 662 F. Supp 2d 33 (DDC 2009) have held that diligent copyright owners have a duty to protect their rights. Courts, however, have allowed copyright owners to re-coup damages from the previous three years before filing. I suspect that the court will eventually limit any damages to the last three years.

I do wonder if Apple or Amazon (co-defendants in these cases) will be able to find success in that they that had relied, in effect, on the "tolling" of the statute of limitations and should be protected against any lawsuits.

For hip-hop studies, these cases are reminders the extent to which hip-hop, and the role of deejays, was forced to change radically because of how copyright get applied to hip-hop.

For those interested in intellectual property law, it shows how the current IP regime actually harms innovation and rewards copyright trolling rather than creative activity.