Ed Sheeran found not liable for copyright infringement in Marvin Gaye lawsuit | Hacker News Reader

Ed Sheeran found not liable for copyright infringement in Marvin Gaye lawsuit

theguardian.com

75 pointsneverminder13 comments

This is a relief, i was genuinely shocked this was even brought forward to be honest.

It's also a bit counter productive for the Gaye family too to be doing this. They already sued it seems LST year for 5+ million USD. If I was looking for a piece of music I needed to pay royalties on, i would rethink the great music from Marvin Gaye.

I believe in this case it wasn’t Gaye’s family that brought the suit but rather the family of his co-writer.

Wow.. that's not what was implied at all, this is only the second article I've read on it but I don't remember reading that. Will have to check that one up!

The plaintiff is the family of the song's late co-writer, Ed Townsend.

Same here, I am really glad about this ruling and hope it doesn't make it to an appeal.

Honestly though, it does sound like the Marvin Gaye song, a lot.

Not that I think this lawsuit is legit or anything... But...

Sheerhan claimed he's only vaguely familiar with it. Is he fucking serious?

He's a musician, and only vaguely familiar with Marvin Gaye's "Let's get it on." Does he only write his own music, and not listen to anything ever? I'm the least educated person in music, and even I know the song well enough to know that this song sounds a lot like it.

> and even I know the song well enough

There's some selection bias here - you're saying this because you are familiar with that song and reading this. But, ask lots of people to choose a song that they are most familiar with and you'll likely find you know a tiny % of them.

As a trained musician, I couldn't have put it better myself. I often get the same reaction watching yt 'reaction' videos.

this case is a lot closer than the "Blurred Lines" case, but both are hogwash

Agree on the Blurred Lines. I mean you read a description of the case and it's hard to believe they won.

Now listen to both songs and ... well, I'm copyright minimalist but it's a little bit easier to see what they were getting at. Still as you say hogwash.

> The singer is also facing claims over Thinking Out Loud in the same court from a company owned by investment banker David Pullman that holds copyright interests in the Gaye song.

I expect we'll see more of this as investment firms continue to consolidate copyrights. It's not at all clear to me how any of this promotes the progress of science or the useful arts.

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