What do Pharrell Williams, Vanilla Ice and Ed Sheeran have in common? Vanilla Ice and Williams were both involved in some of the most high-profile copyright infringement lawsuits of the past 50 years. The 1980s rapper attempted to delineate his “Ice Ice Baby” from Queen and David Bowie’s “Under Pressure” — it didn’t work — and Bowie and Queen eventually received songwriting credit and royalties. “Shape of You” was accused of having a lyrically similar rhythm to TLC’s classic “No Scrubs,” earning the latter’s writers, Kandi Burruss and Tameka Cottle, credits on Sheeran’s song. In the video above, we explore how experts tell the difference between infringement and inspiration, and what that means for the music industry.

Source: Washington Post March 04, 2019 15:36 UTC