The New York Times?recently published a story about filmmaker Jenifer Nelson’s lawsuit disputing the copyright of the Happy Birthday Song. It turns out the song everybody sings is privately owned by the Warner Music Group, which in 1988 shelled out some $25 million
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Needless to say, Warner Group has done well for itself. The Happy Birthday song’s copyright currently generates $2 million in licensing fees every year with some licenses generating $10,000 per performance. The song is set to enter into the
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The story has revealed some of the more baffling details of copyright law. How can a song whose music was written in the 1880’s and whose lyrics were finalized in the 1920’s be owned by a company that had no creative involvement in creating it? How can you charge money to those who sing it? Did Marilyn Monroe have to cut a check after singing it to President Kennedy? Do I have to pay five grand whenever I sing it?
This conjures images of men in suits with aviator shades breaking up small children’s birthday celebrations ? the “happy birthday” police, if you will.
Part of the explanation lies with the convoluted history of copyright law in the United States. In 1790,
Michael Michael Kors Congress enacted the first copyright act, which stipulated that upon registration, the copyright’s author was granted 14 years of protection with the option of an additional 14-year renewal.
Initially, copyright law covered only literary works, charts and maps. Over the next century, Congress would expand the scope of copyright law to cover artistic works, photographs, sculptures and yes, musical compositions.
In 1909, Congress extended protection to 28 years with
Michael Kors East We a renewable option of another 28 years.
Finally, in 1976, Congress overhauled everything. An author’s work would receive full copyright protection for the life of the author plus an additional 75 years. The new law said the author did not have to register their work, but simply recording or fixing the work to a tangible medium of expression established the copyright’s legality. To be fair, registration granted the holder the ability to enforce their copyright via lawsuit. Today, upon committing the musical notes and lyrics of a composition to paper, songs would receive copyright protection.
Throughout
mk tote all of this,
Michael Kors Handbag “Happy Birthday” was licensed, relicensed, placed in portfolios, purchased and performed. The song sailed through the milieu of American copyright law revisions to somehow survive intact today. Jenifer Nelson’s lawyers will provide evidence demonstrating how “Happy Birthday” was never truly copyrighted in the first place, and even if it was, lost that copyright protection sometime back in 1921. The argument focuses on the idea that since the original authors never sought registration, the song fell into the public domain decades ago. The first copyright issued ? sometime in 1933 ? never should have been granted, and renewal over the years has simply compounded that original mistake.
The legal argument touches on the idea of the public domain as a bulwark to private appropriation of intellectual property. This idea has long been understood. The Romans termed it res publicae meaning “property or things belonging to the public good.” The Statute of Anne, the English parliamentary act that is the ancestral grandfather to modern copyright law, knew to limit private ownership. Copyright is a nod by society to the inventor of art providing a semi-monopolistic grant of ownership. It incentivizes and facilitates the development literature, music and art. But underlying copyright is the idea that at some point, the author dies. Benefits can no longer be drawn from their idea. The idea dissolves from private to public, from one to all. It belongs to culture, to society.
This is why discovering that a media conglomerate owns “Happy Birthday” comes off so unsettling. Prior to last week few people likely had given much consideration to the history of the “Happy Birthday” song; it was just a little chant we tacitly agreed to recite on each other’s birthdays. Without ever verbalizing or conceptualizing, we assumed one person or one company could never own “Happy Birthday.” Hopefully, this lawsuit ensures that it no longer will be the case.
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