Sports Law

By Laurel Wickersham Salisbury. Art both creates and possesses cultural value, but this value can also be monetized, and, increasingly in today’s society, commercialized. This is especially true of iconic artists such as Frida Kahlo, Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol and the like whose personal identities have become as instantly recognizable ... Read More

We got the first straight answer that we’ve ever heard about PledgeMusic.  This is from the UK Insolvency Service regarding the PledgeMusic debacle in response to my tweet yesterday: We really appreciate the Insolvency Service taking the time to respond so quickly. ... Read More

We have entered an era where Big Tech controls the purse strings for the Mechanical Licensing Collective.  Despite that oddity, it’s refreshing to see the leaders of the music industry come together to form the Music Artists Coalition as a counterbalance to Big Tech and its counterpart, the MIC Coalition. ... Read More

An argument for the CASE Act — Indie musician, composer, and cellist Zoë Keating cuts through the unfounded claims against the CASE Act, which would create a copyright small claims court for individuals and small businesses, and shares her experiences with infringement. She writes, “My work is supposedly protected by ... Read More

Michael Karanicolas, Yale University Information Society Project, is publishing Subverting Democracy to Save Democracy: Canada’s Extra-Constitutional Approaches to Battling 'Fake News' in volume 17 of the Canadian Journal of Law and Technology (2019). Here is the abstract. This paper considers ... Read More

I commend to you the fantastic and detailed analysis of PledgeMusic’s open source financials created by Eilonwy’s emu (@myemuisemo) that is a real eye opener.  Read her post “Plunging into PledgeMusic’s Financial Statements” on her site Myemuisemo. Her extensive analysis suggests that the circle of interesting persons may be expandable ... Read More

Below is the Center for Art Law's monthly case law digest. Please note that in September, the Center for Art Law will make its Case Law digests a subscription-based feature of its otherwise free newsletter - Art Law Blast (https://itsartlaw.org/newsletter/). If you would like to continue receiving the case updates, ... Read More

The latest issue of Music & Copyright is now available for subscribers to download. Here are some of the highlights. Recorded-music sales for UMG continue to outpace closest rival SME French media company Vivendi and Japanese electronics giant Sony Corp. have reported financial details for their respective music subsidiaries, UMG ... Read More

It appears that PledgeMusic has not planned on going into administration (like reorganization bankruptcy), at least not since June 13, 2019.  Therefore, any statements the company or its representatives have made since that date must be looked at anew. Because the company had guided all of its potential creditors toward ... Read More

According to USA Today: On [July 25, 2019], member of Congress and Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard launched a lawsuit against Google claiming “serious and continuing violations of Tulsi’s right to free speech” because of Google’s suspension of the Gabbard campaign’s advertising account during the first Democratic presidential debate. The ... Read More

Many states, including Kentucky, have adopted the Uniform Trust Code (“UTC”).  The UTC is a comprehensive statutory schemework governing the administration of trusts.  ... Read More

By Angela Peco Edited by Elissa D. Hecker Below are articles of interest in Entertainment, Arts, Sports, Media, and General News: Entertainment New York Attorney General's Office Wants to Prevent Anna Sorokin from Profiting from Netflix Show New York's attorney general filed a request in State Supreme Court to block ... Read More

By Timothy Chung. In 2018, GQ magazine published a piece on Chinese state (“Beijing”) efforts to repatriate looted antiquities, starting off by examining a series of daring art thefts that occurred across Europe. ... Read More

It’s Time for Congress to Modernize the United States Copyright Office — Senate Intellectual Property Subcommittee Chairman Tillis writes that his Subcommittee “will convene a hearing later this month to provide oversight and support of the Copyright Office [and] will also announce a bipartisan, bicameral legislative effort to update the ... Read More

You may have seen the book reviews of “Spotify Untold” (or in Swedish ““Spotify Inifrån”).  The book is currently only available in Swedish, but in a new marketing twist the authors are on a book tour in the US.  Must be nice. The writers seemed to have missed the streaming ... Read More

Every year, Sotheby’s Institute of Art in London runs a two-part series of Art Law courses in which different topics in art law are explained by industry professionals. This article covers Part I of the series- a two day course held on May 30th, 2019 covering the topics of due ... Read More

Since our country’s inception in 1776, Americans have come to find that very few things in life are certain, with the exception of death and taxes.  In the world of trusts, these two certainties have historically gone hand-in-hand.  On Friday, June 21, 2019, however, the United States Supreme Court’s decision ... Read More

By Lisa Ornest Edited by Elissa D. Hecker Below, for your browsing convenience, the categories are divided into Entertainment, Arts, Sports, Media, and General News Entertainment Package Deals In April, on orders from their union, more than 7,000 stage and screen writers fired their agents who would not sign a ... Read More

Ben Worthy, University of London, Birkbeck College, is publishing Freedom of Information in Europe: Creation, Context and Conflict in Contested Trade-Offs: Transparency and Secrecy in European Democracies (forthcoming) This paper takes an overview of the development and implementation of Access ... Read More

Federal District Judge Lucy Koh has dismissed a lawsuit brought by the Federal Agency of News (FAN) against Facebook for shutting down its account. FAN argued that Facebook was interfering with its free-speech rights. Judge Koh ruled that Facebook is ... Read More

  What are the chances that PledgeMusic will just disappear into the night, never file bankruptcy and never pay back the artists, fans and vendors?  The less you talk about Pledge’s misdeeds, the more likely they simply are never pursued by anyone.     ... Read More

The Sixth Circuit affirms a lower court ruling dismissing a defamation lawsuit against the New York Times. An Ohio State University professor sued over a NYT article, but the lower court held, and the 6th circuit agreed, that a reasonable ... Read More

Senate Judiciary Committee Passes CASE Act Legislation Streamlining Copyright Disputes — A big step forward for the bill, though it still has a long way to go. Based on recommendations made by the US Copyright Office in 2013, the bill would create a voluntary, inexpensive alternative venue to federal court ... Read More

By Hannah Tager. Both emerging and established artists are reporting more and more cases of censorship by platforms like Facebook and Instagram, which was acquired by Facebook, Inc. in 2012. ... Read More

The Latest episode of my Entertainment Law podcast, Entertainment Law Update, is now available for your enjoyment. Listen here, or subscribe and download in your favorite podcast listening app.  Show notes are located at http://entertainmentlawupdate.com/111 Here's what we talked about.. VIDANGEL POSTMORTEMTRUMP CAN’T BLOCK ON TWITTERTEXAS APPEAL COURT: COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT BUT SOVEREIGN ... Read More

The latest issue of Music & Copyright is now available for subscribers to download. Here are some of the highlights. The US Copyright Office selects the Music Licensing Collective and Digital Licensee Coordinator The US Copyright Office (the Office) has chosen the two groups that will facilitate the new system ... Read More

Sprigman Throws a Definition at Blake Morgan The Spitting Image of the Modern Major General MTP readers may remember the name Christopher Sprigman.  Most recently,  we have identified him as a counsel to Spotify in the “Nashville cases” brought against his firm’s client Spotify by four plaintiffs represented by well-known ... Read More

Ronan O Fathaigh, University of Amsterdam, Institute for Information Law, has published The Chilling Effect of Turkey’s Article 301 Insult Law at 3 European Human Rights Law Review 298 (2019). Here is the abstract. This article discusses how the approach ... Read More

By Chantelle A. Gyamfi Edited by Elissa D. Hecker Below, for your browsing convenience, the categories are divided into Entertainment, Arts, Sports, Media, and General News: ENTERTAINMENT Spotify Settles Copyright Suits Brought by Songwriters In 2017, streaming giant Spotify was sued for copyright infringement. The suits were brought against Spotify ... Read More

[We’re thrilled to welcome David Poe to MTP!] by David Poe Spotify’s disastrous “dance like nobody’s paying” ad campaign has now been demolished in the national press, garnering negative coverage in Newsweek, Billboard, NME, Hypebot, and more. Sometimes big corporations slip up and show us what they really think of ... Read More