Any musician should be legally allowed to rip-off any musician
A couple cases of musical plagiarism in the Finnish media lately, both are “David vs. Goliath” situations. First we have superstar Timbaland ripping off a song by demo artist Janne Suni AKA Tempest. Then we have Finnish singer Katra and producer Risto Asikainen accused of ripping off the song “Jillian” by superstar Dutch metal band Within Temptation.
In the first scenario a wealthy superstar rips off the little-known artist and nothing happens – the wealthy superstar can rip-off whatever he wants, the little-known artist doesn’t have the money to fight the case. In the second scenario the tables are turned, the little-known artist gets accused of ripping off the wealthy superstar – an “expert panel” is quickly formed to see if it’s plagiarism, and as it turns out, it’s not.
So here’s how the current copyright/plagiarism legislation seems to work – Goliath can rip off David anytime he wants without any repercussions. But if Goliath even *thinks* that David is ripping him off, a serious investigation ensues.
So here’s my suggestion – Any musician should be legally allowed to rip-off any musician, leave it up to the internet to discover these plagiarisms then publicly ostracize the true thief. Cause at the moment, the wealthy superstar can plagiarize, but the poor-nobody can’t. So this would simply level the playing field and allow everyone to do it.
