Recently, Ed Sheeran received serious accusations for his song that allegedly plagiarized the work of legendary musician Marvin Gaye. It was so serious that Ed Sheeran had to take legal action to settle it, you know! How come? Yes, it all started with accusations of plagiarism over Ed Sheeran’s hit song “Thinking Out Loud” which was released in 2014. Structure Asset Sale (SAS) alleges that Ed Sheeran’s song has plagiarized Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On” hit. Previously, the song was created by Marvin Gaye and Ed Townsend, but it was SAS who bought a third of the shares. Furthermore, SAS continued the allegations into a lawsuit that Ed Sheeran had committed copyright infringement. SAS decided to take this alleged plagiarism case to court. In its lawsuit, SAS said that Ed Sheeran’s hit “Thinking Out Loud” had taken a number of assets from the song created by Marvin Gaye.
Ed Sheeran denies copyright infringement allegations
Regarding SAS’s allegations of copyright infringement, Ed Sheeran certainly denies this and is willing to prove it in court. In Ed Sheeran’s fifth trial on May 1, 2023, the co-writer of the song “Thinking Out Loud” explained that the song was more similar to Van Morrison’s “Have I Told You Lately”. During the trial, Ed Sheeran also told in detail about the process of creating the song “Thinking Out Loud” with Amy Wage. The lyrics themselves were stated to be inspired by their personal problems, especially because Sheeran’s grandmother was diagnosed with cancer and his grandfather had recently passed away. Meanwhile, Amy Wage had to deal with the grief of her sick family. Ed Sheeran also made a surprising statement during the trial. Where he stated that he would stop making music if he was proven to have plagiarized Marvin Gaye’s song. Ed Sheeran thinks the accusations against him are more like an action to insult and bring down his career. Because according to him, if listened to by ordinary people or experts, his hit song and Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On” are not at all similar.
Ed Sheeran wins copyright infringement case
Ed Sheeran’s fans and the music-loving public were quite nervous about the ‘music retirement’ statement made by Ed Sheeran some time ago. However, on May 5, 2023, the court finally stated that Ed Sheeran was proven innocent. The judge in charge of handling the case, Sophia Nels, confirmed that Ed Sheeran was not proven to have plagiarized Marvin Gaye’s song “Let’s Get It On”. The judge even announced that Ed Sheeran was proven to have independently created the song “Thinking Out Loud”. After the trial, Ed Sheeran expressed his extreme relief and pleasure with the wise decision of the New York Federal Court. For him, the accusation of stealing a song is a sad thing because he knows the difficulty of hard work creatively.
The Importance of Copyright Registration for Songs
The case of the dispute between Ed Sheeran and Marvin Gaye has made people, especially artists working in the creative industry, more aware of the importance of copyright registration. Copyright or often called copyright is one part of intellectual property that has the broadest scope of protected objects, one of which is a song or music with or without text. Copyright registration aims to appreciate a work and encourage other creators to continue to create other quality works. Not only that, copyright registration also has a series of other purposes, including:
Exclusive Rights
It is the right of the creator to control the mechanism of ownership as well as distribution of his/her work. This exclusive right means that anyone who wants to use, copy, reproduce, and sell a copyrighted work, must first register permission from the creator.
Moral Rights
Even if the work has been purchased, the buyer must still include the name of the creator of the work. The moral rights of the work will always be attached to the creator.
Economic Rights
Economic rights will make the creator of the work entitled to get economic rewards from parties who use his work. Meanwhile, for those who intentionally infringe the copyright of others, may be subject to imprisonment for a minimum of one month and / or a fine of at least Rp1 million, or a maximum of seven years and / or a maximum fine of Rp5 billion rupiah. This is in accordance with the provisions of Article 72 of the Copyright Act.
KH Contact
Such is the explanation for the case of copyright infringement allegations that occurred between Ed Sheeran and Marvin Gaye. Now, we also increasingly realize how important the role of copyright or IPR on the work of creation produced. Where to honor and appreciate the efforts of the creator of the work, the state has provided legal protection against intellectual property. As for this HAKI registration or recording of creations must be done to give birth to copyright on the creation. Registration in this system is useful so that the registrant is de facto and de jure recognized as the creator or the person entitled to the copyright of the registered work. Without registration, a creator is not entitled to his creation. Well, for KH pals who also want to register their copyright, you can immediately contact Kontrak Hukum. We provide the most complete IPR registration services ranging from brands, artworks, musical compositions, photographic works, to industrial designs starting from only Rp2 million! For ordering information that suits your creation needs, please visit this page. If you have other questions about IPR, don’t hesitate to consult with us on the Ask KH page, or send a Direct Message (DM) to Kontrak Hukum’s Instagram social media account @kontrakhukum.
