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Comment by rmsaksida | Hacker News Reader

I totally get it, but the song is also very famous in Brazil and not because of her.

That doesn’t mean the performer who made the version that is known worldwide should not be rewarded properly by it. I am not sure the debate has took this turn. Because the music is known in Brazil with different performers, it attenuates the cheap payment she got for the English version.

The article states that she avoided performing in Brazil because she felt it didn’t treat her well. Taking from the Brazilians in this thread, it checks.

I'm Brazilian and have nothing against Astrud. The point however is that she's simply now well known in Brazil. She became famous as the singer for the English version of Girl from Ipanema. In Brazil this song has portuguese lyrics and is sung by other interpreters. That is, I imagine, why she wasn't as well received in Brazil as in the US and other countries.

The point is not that she wasn’t as famous in Brazil. The point is that she was paid only $120 after performing the version of the song that became famous worldwide.

Also, the article states that she consciously avoided performing in Brazil.

So what? at the time they payed her nobody knew it will be a huge hit, she was an unknown singer who got a chance to sing a song created by famous and talented creators of her home country. So they payed her a payday salary of a singer. She probably got payed more after that for live performances.

Is it fair that others capture all of the rewards of something she helped create?

What's wrong with a little bit of profit sharing?

Right now, writers in Hollywood are striking because the streaming medias treat them as mere day laborers, denying those writers the residuals they'd rightfully receive for the same work published by any other medium.

The reality is that even Tom Jobim didn't make much money from this song. He later said in an interview that the contract he signed gave most of the money to the American recording company and the writer of the English lyrics. He received only a small amount of the profits from this song.

TIL, thanks. Disappointed, but not surprised.

> That doesn’t mean the performer who made the version...

She didn't make it. She sang a part of it. And it isn't as if they knew how successful this recording would become.

I'm not Brazilian, but I'm a fan of bossa nova. The way some people are talking in this thread as if the entire song was created by Astrud seems absurd. The position completely erases the work done by the men who pioneered bossa nova as a genre. Do you actually listen to this music? What do you do when listening to this album? Do you fast forward past the lengthy saxophone solos?

Labor is the source of all wealth. Maybe they should get some fraction of the profits.

I call my radical proposal Profit Sharing.

Maybe all compensation should include some stock.

I support any and all efforts to get our gini coefficient back down to 0.35 or lower. Worker-directed social enterprises, co-ops, trust busting, tax enforcement, universal healthcare, universal basic income, repeated radical cashectomies of the 1%, name & shame... Whatever works.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient

I am not one of those people saying Astrud is the main responsible for creating the song.

My position is that her contribution deserved a portion of the profits the song generate larger than $120. I think it’s fair that she should earn more directly from it, even acknowledging that the song kickstarted her great career and was the foundation of a lot of profits in the future.

I am not saying it was illegal or the $120 was paid on bad faith at the time of recording. I am saying that after the song becoming a worldwide hit, she deserved to earn more. It might not have been illegal for her to earn only $120, but it was unfair in my opinion.

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