PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Songwriting Miley Cyrus’ flowers involved Copyright lawsuit hinges on a judges decision

The writing is terrible and the judge is an idiot. I expect that, if not dismissed, some appeals court will look at Ory v MacDonald. It established a three year limit for bringing such suits. The song in question is fourteen years old.

Although Alan Klein taught the world how to to buy rights to a song for the express purpose of suing another, he was deprived of the proceeds since he sued his client, George Harrison.

Would that three years not be from the date of "Flowers" rather than the date of the Bruno Mars song?

No — otherwise, there'd be no point in copyright suits. Ory's heirs had three years to file a suit against Country Joe McDonald for his 1967 song, The I Feel Like I'm Fixin' to Die Rag infringing Muskrat Ramble written in 1926. Instead, they waited 34 years till the royalties had built up. Judge might have cut some slack had it been filed a reasonable time after the Woodstock movie came out a couple years later—but that wasn't done. 2001 was way too long.

This did not apply when Annie Bredon sued Led Zep over Babe, I'm Going to Leave You. She didn't know until her daughter heard her singing it at a party and said, Mom, I didn't know you knew any Zeppelin songs. In that case, the correct form PA-Published had never been filed when Joan Baez recorded it in 1962, The Association in 1965 or Quicksilver Messenger Service in 1968 (all of whom paid) and so she was not entitled to back royalties from Page & Plant until that certificate was obtained — that mistake cost her an estimated $11M. Once the correct form was filed, she could only sue for royalties going forward. Because of the middle section, she eventually split those royalties 50/50 with Page & Plant in 1990. She next tried to sue in English court where she was told that GB followed the US model: not entitled to sue royalties on a Published work before the date that the correct paperwork has been filed—that others paid doesn't matter. US Copyright is quite clear on this. Had she filed the correct form and knew within the three years and filed within three years, it's probable she would have owned 100%. Had the correct paperwork been filed back then but she'd knowingly waited till 1988, it is quite possible that the court would have applied a limit—or not.Ory wasn't also filed till 11 years after Babe... was settled. I'm leaving a lot of details out because they do not go to the question.

There was no doubt that Led Zep had recorded Bredon's song—there was always going to be a settlement and nowadays, the three-year precedent is normally applied. OTOH, Country Joe copied only part of the melody of Muskrat Ramble ("And it's 1, 1, 3, What are we fighting for...") so the Ory case was about authorship and why it was tossed completely for waiting too long.

Again, I am not an attorney and I am not practicing law. These are the facts as I read them in 1990. Unfortunately the news articles that old cannot be found in the internet. Justia is where one can find Federal filings but it does not go back to 1990. The only reference to Bredon v Zep is this much later case that cites it. SKIDMORE v. LED ZEPPELIN et al

Ah, right. Now that makes sense.

Thanks Mike.