From BBC:
Men At Work lose song plagiarism appeal
Related StoriesAustralian band Men at Work have lost an appeal against a ruling which found their 1983 hit single Down Under was partly copied from a folk song.
Australia’s Federal Court upheld the decision which stated part of the song’s melody came from the tune Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree.
Record label EMI argued the writers did not plagiarise because the inclusion of two bars from the tune was a tribute.
The music company has also been ordered to pay costs.
The latest decision clears the way for Larrikin Music, the copyright owners for Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree, to claim millions of dollars in unpaid royalties from Down Under writers Colin Hay and Ron Strykert.
Weird. I didn’t know there was a law against plagiarism. Even so, it would require evidence of wilful deception, e.g. that the song was asserted to be wholly original in the knowledge that it wasn’t.
I thought this was all about copyright, which as we know is nothing to do with plagiarism.
Very perverse for someone to be found ‘guilty’ of copying a folksong, when the whole fricking point of folksong is to be freely resung and adapted.
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