Age of Accountability

Parents are usually held accountable for the behavior of their children in public and some private places. Some people feel that children should be held accountable for their own actions when they reach a certain age but there are numerous private debates about what that particular age should be. In the United States, the legal age of consent varies by state. Many of us know that the legal age which to purchase lottery tickets and tobacco products is 18 years old and the legal age for consuming alcohol is 21 years old.

As times change, I see many parents allowing their children to make their own decisions at an even younger age. I do believe that the abundance of technological advances does play a role in the dynamic. My five-year-old nephew can take the iPad (that he shares with his parents) and find music videos via YouTube. When I was his age, I wasn’t able to type anything, although we did not have iPads back then. Most of my entertainment at that age was from television shows on PBS and videocassette movies that my parents purchased for me.  As well, he is able to take anyone’s cell phone and call anyone that he is allowed to. At his age, he’s able to make more decisions on his own than we were able to do so at the same age.

Being that children are given so many tools to learn from at such a young age, I think that the age to be held accountable should be judged according to that particular child. If the parents are teaching their children the rules of responsibility at a young age, then I don’t see a reason that they are not able to allow them to be held accountable for what they do. I think that this method of upbringing can help them as they get older. This can prevent them from making bad decisions when they reach that legal age of consent. It’s understandable that everyone doesn’t raise their children the same as others but basic principles should be instilled in the forward-thinking children early on.


----- Jackee Walker

Individuality

What Makes You Different? 

According to a Google search, individuality can be defined as “the quality or character of a particular person or thing that distinguishes them from others of the same kind… separate existence.” 

As we all continue to reproduce and raise children, one thing that many suffer from is being recognized as an individual. I have a twin sister and, although we are not identical, it seemed as though it was extremely difficult for some people to tell us apart. Growing up, my parents would dress us alike (as many twins are dressed) but we didn’t see it that way. We wanted to be seen as different people at a very young age.

Babies are naturally born selfish so we grew up not wanting to look alike as well. To give a little difference, my parents would put us in the same outfit but would have us to wear different colors. This seemed to help us somewhat. My mother told me that when we started school, she requested that we not be placed in the same class so that we could learn to not depend on each other. As we got older, I think that this really did help us out a lot. We were able to form our own friendships outside of each other. This allowed us to form our own personalities independent of each other so people could really get to know us. We didn’t begin to have classes together until we were in high school, but even then, it would be only one class out of the entire day. By this time, our friends were able to tell us apart.

Once we finished high school, we went to two different colleges and people we amazed to know that we were twins when they seen us together. I think that we figured out who wanted to be as we grew into adults. Shockingly, we are a lot alike but we are still very different from each other. We tend to forget that we are twins because we feel as though we are just sisters who look alike. Few times people get us confused but they soon realize it when they don’t get the response that they were expecting. Now that we feel that we are so much different from each other, we find it fun to dress alike just to shock strangers when they look at us together.

I think it if wasn’t for our parents forcing us to separate from each other at such a young age, we wouldn’t have been able to become individuals and learn more about ourselves on our own.

---- Jackee Walker

Sources: Google.com

Expert Advice for Industry Liabilities

Gordon Firemark is the producer of various podcasts entitled Entertainment Law Update available on iTunes for free. During each of his podcasts, he discusses various legal cases with other attorneys. While discussing different forms of copyright, he talked about the case of Faulkner Literary Rights v. Sony Pictures Classic. In this particular case, there was a debate over the phrase “The Past is Never Dead… It’s Not Even Past.” Faulkner is suing Sony for using it in a movie. Federal Judge agreed that it’s not Copyright Infringement; referring to it as a small portion from the book (9-word quote).

Looking at the use of video games, EA Sports was in court (9^th Circuit Court of Appeals) because they were being used for using collegiate athlete’s likeness. This isn’t protected under the Fist Amendment. According to the research, student athletes cannot be compensated for use of their likeness. EA Sport’s defense is that he students’ names are not being used on the jerseys in the video games. The court’s ruling found that elements of the athlete’s likeness were found in the game but it did not go far enough to be considered infringement.

In 2011, musical group No Doubt sued ActiVision over the video game Band Hero’s unauthorized use of their image. The court’s ruling decided that creative elements of their likeness in the game were used for commercial exploitation of the band’s image and that it wasn’t fair use.

(Firemark, Episode 43 - No Copyright, Sherlock)

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 In November 2011, Julie Tamor (author and director) sued the producers of Spiderman “Turn of the Dark” for firing her. She was claiming royalties were not properly paid out to her. The producers filed a counterclaim stating that it took them a lot of efforts to save the show after she was fired. In August 2012, there was a preliminary settlement of the case being dismissed. As of May 2013, both parties are still pushing for the case to go to trial.

Photographer David Harney took a picture of a father and his daughter. It turns out that the father had kidnapped his own child from a different country and brought her to the US. Later on there were actors portrayed of the father-daughter in a movie so Harney sued Sony Pictures for copyright infringement. The jury awarded the photographer monies; after appeal, courts ruled that there was no way that the jury could determine that there was any copyright infringement because the photographer has nothing to do with the creative elements of the photo (photos were notably different in composition and color making them different). Attorneys are questioning what copyright protected elements does the photographers hold in the photo as well as what was the purpose for the photo being included in the movie. The court is not giving credit to the photographer even though he actually stopped the father in the street to take the photo of them.

Subway is trying to sue another restaurant that is claiming that their sandwiches are 12 inch. Others are claiming that subway’s sandwiches are only 11 inches long. Looking from a trademark standpoint, there are no registrations occurring because other restaurants have been blocking them. The “foot long” claims are descriptive but not actually the size of the food. The question of puffery comes up when people are starting to ask, “Does the consumer have a reasonable expectation of the sandwich really being 12 inches long?”

Copyright for Students and Teachers: What right does the school have to the work of students to display throughout the school when they want? Students should be able to own their works that they create while in school. Copyrights are being conveyed to the school board and districts. School districts want to be given recognition for the works. Students are being asked to sign over rights of research when grants are being provided to allow them to do the works.

(Firemark, Episode 38 - When a Foot is Only 11 Inches, and a Batmobile is a Character)

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Questions of misrepresentation come up in the case of William Eggleston. An art collector purchased 8 photographic works from Eggleston claiming that they were a part of a limited edition collection (16x20 in size individually numbered). Eggleston reprinted more of the images in different sizes, mediums and production dates and sold them. This caused the originals to decrease in value. Lower courts dismissed all claims of infringement; stating that they are all different from each other.

(Firemark, Episode 40 - Areo, ReDigi, Veoh & IMDB)

----- Jackee Walker

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Sources:

Firemark, G. (n.d.). Episode 38 - When a Foot is Only 11 Inches, and a Batmobile is a Character. Entertainment Law Update Podcast .

Firemark, G. (n.d.). Episode 40 - Areo, ReDigi, Veoh & IMDB. Entertainment Law Update Podcast .

Firemark, G. (n.d.). Episode 43 - No Copyright, Sherlock. Entertainment Law Update Podcast .

Music Industry Liabilities

When working to maintain a positive reputation within the music industry, many people see all that can go wrong. Whether you’re an artist and a manager, you have to make sure that you are handling things the proper way so that you can avoid any and all lawsuits that can be brought against you. Many times, artists can be taken advantage of without even being fully aware of the situation until it’s already to late. Some things that artists many come in contact with is not being able to receive the royalties that they are entitled to fro the work that they do. As well, there are times that artists have to sue other artists for not getting their permission to sample their work. Another liability that many face is the mishandling of their money that managers keep from them.

Having proper knowledge of the royalties that you’re entitled to worked in the favor of rapper Chuck D (of Public Enemy). In 2011, he filed a lawsuit again Universal Music Group because they were not keeping track of digital music sales therefore causing Public Enemy to not be able to be paid all of the monies that were owed to them. When an artist agrees to sell their music via any web-based programs, they should be able to receive royalties from sales of CDs and licenses of their digital downloads. But in this particular lawsuit, Universal was not properly separating the two categories, which was causing the group to not receive all of the money that is due to them. This case had lead to other artists [and their management] to look into their own royalty accounts. I think that it is extremely imperative for artists to make sure that they have someone on their side to watch out for their financial future when it comes to their royalties. If they are able to prove exactly how much money that they are missing out on from this miscalculation, I think that Public Enemy is due for a positive outcome from this lawsuit (Sisario, 2011).

Many music fans have become very familiar with the fame of Jay Z and Kayne West’s album Watch the Throne. Many of us have been able to find at least one track from this album that we enjoy listening to. In light of the release of this outstanding record, Syl Johnson has filed a lawsuit against them citing that they have illegally sampled one of his hits, “Different Strokes.” I think that this case could have all been avoided had West made sure that he “finished what he started” when he expressed intentions of sampling the song back in 2010 for a prior project which never got proper permission for use. Being able to gain proper authorization will allow many artists from having to back track later on down the road. Now Johnson is requesting that the duo pay him for this sampling his music (Rolling Stone, 2012).

As the manager of any music artist, you will always remain under tiresome scrutiny if the funds don’t seem to add up the right way. Some managers do take advantage of their artists by stealing money from them. Those allegations are presented soon after he decided to no longer have him as her manager and it takes a lot for him to prove it to be wrong. In the case of Matthew Knowles (father of Beyonce Knowles-Carter), he was being accused by Beyonce’s camp that he was stealing money from her. Although he claims that he has never taken any money from his daughter, there hasn’t been record of a formal lawsuit being filed. Even at this point, Beyonce still does not even speak to her father. I feel that whether or not she files the lawsuit against him, he has lost far more than money and that is the relationship with his daughter (Moody, 2011).

No matter the role you play as a professional in the music industry, there are various type of liability situations that one can find themselves in. Many of them may not have been done intentional (because there are some that are done intentionally) but we all must learn to protect ourselves. Just by being careful to cover all of the bases, we have rectify a situation before someone tries to take us to court over a small issue.

---- Jackee Walker

Sources:

Moody, N. M. (2011, July 14). Mathew Knowles: I Did Not Steal From Beyonce. Retrieved August 7, 2013, from Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/15/mathew-knowles-i-did-not-_n_899636.html

Rolling Stone. (2012, March 12). Kanye West and Jay Z Settle Syl Johnson Lawsuit. Retrieved August 7, 2013, from Rolling Stone: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/kanye-west-and-jay-z-settle-syl-johnson-lawsuit-20120312

Sisario, B. (2011, November 3). Chuck D. Sues Universal Music Over Digital Royalties. Retrieved August 7, 2013, from New York Times: http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/03/chuck-d-sues-universal-music-over-digital-royalties/?_r=0