The Southern District of Florida has granted summary judgment to SiriusXM on Flo & Eddie’s claims that Sirius infringed Flo & Eddie’s public performance rights under Florida state law by streaming pre-1972 sound recordings. Although Flo & Eddie have prevailed in the trial courts in the Southern District of New York and Central District of California on nearly identical claims, the court found that “Florida is different” because, unlike California and New York, the state has no statutory or decisional law recognizing public performance rights in pre-1972 sound recordings. The New York case is currently on interlocutory appeal to the Second Circuit on the merits, whereas the California case is likewise on appeal, but on the issue of the court’s grant of class certification following a summary judgment ruling in favor of Flo & Eddie. Flo & Eddie will no doubt appeal the Florida ruling to the Eleventh Circuit.
TOPIC : State law
Flo & Eddie 2, SiriusXM 1
From “Happy Together” to “Eve of Destruction”
Turtles Seek to Upend Streaming Business Models for Pre-1972 Sound Recordings
On Friday I had the privilege of speaking at the AIPLA Spring Meeting in Los Angeles on the subject of pre-1972 sound recordings and the current series of lawsuits brought by the successors of the Turtles against Sirius XM regarding royalties over pre-1972 sound recordings. Copyright law in the United States is almost exclusively governed by the federal Copyright Act, which preempts equivalent state laws. As originally drafted, however, federal copyright law did not extend copyright protection to sound recordings, leaving those works to be regulated by the states. Congress amended the copyright law in 1972 to add federal protection for sound recordings, but it granted this protection on a prospective basis only. Sound recordings fixed before February 15, 1972 thus remain subject to state law. A series of lawsuits brought by Flo & Eddie, Inc. (“Flo & Eddie”), the entity that owns the copyrights for sound recordings created by the 1960s rock group the Turtles, is upending rules thought long established regarding performance rights of pre-1972 sound recordings under state law. Continue reading
Pandora’s Box:
Turtles Actions Threaten to Upend Music Streaming Models
Copyright law in the United States is almost exclusively governed by the federal Copyright Act, which preempts equivalent state laws. As originally drafted, however, the Copyright Act of 1976 – the current iteration of the Act – made an exception for sound recordings fixed before February 15, 1972, leaving those works to be regulated by the states. State law thus applies to determine the rights and remedies available to the copyright owner of pre-1972 sound recordings. Continue reading