Copyright Suit Against 50 Cent Dismissed
50 Cent’s no song thief, says U.S. District Judge Paul C. Huck, who dimissed a copyright infringement lawsuit against the rapper on Friday.
50 was accused of stealing the opening line from his hit song “In Da Club” from a song by Luther Campbell, formerly of 2 Live Crew.
The suit, filed in Miami federal court in January, charged 50 Cent of changing only one word from the opening line of Campbell’s 1994 song “It’s Your Birthday,” which featured the words “Go Sheila, it’s your birthday.” On “In Da Club,” 50 raps “Go shorty, it’s your birthday.”
Huck found that the phrase was a “common, unoriginal, and noncopyrightable element of the song” and was thus not protected by copyright.
He continued that there are almost no other similarities between the two songs and the opening phrase constituted a mere eleven seconds of the entire song. The two songs, he said, would not be confused by the average person.
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