You're right - I was never sure how that was supposed to work (ie just because you stuck something in an envelope and posted it to yourself doesn't prove you wrote it). But the thinking seem to be that it would help you if you discovered that someone else had nicked your stuff, rather than to help you prove you didn't nick someone elses.
This. And as the registered author of songs that have been published and widely available for the past 30+ years, Steve Harris would be entitled to a presumption of authorship, which Willcock bears the burden of overcoming. See http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/48/section/104.
I am an American and I have heard of Procol Harum. But I only know one song. THE one song. But I might not have even known that one were it not for a popular American film.
Which is the one involved in their famous lawsuit, yes.
Sometimes works can be similar even though you didn't copy the earlier work. You could have come up with it independently. In the case of similar works, one thing a court will consider is whether you had been exposed to the previous work. This was an issue in the Led Zeppelin copyright trial that happened not that long ago. But if you did hear it before and inadvertently copied it, you would still be liable for plagiarism. This is what happened with George Harrison's "My Sweet Lord," which sounds A LOT like "He's So Fine". From the court opinion in that case:
I didn't assume. This is a thread about a potential UK court case involving Iron Maiden though.
This was effectively overturned by the Procol Harum court case.
No, the court in that case didn't get rid of the statutory presumption. The organist still had the burden of proving he substantially contributed to the song. But, he pretty clearly satisfied that burden -- the original songwriters didn't seriously contest that he DID come up with the organ bit at the beginning, albeit after the rest of the song had already been written, and the organ bit is unquestionably a VERY important part of the song (though, arguably, was itself copied from Bach). The main argument on the appeal was just that the organist waited too long to bring his claim, to the prejudice of the defendants. The intermediate court agreed; the House of Lords disagreed. So, the organist wins. (Another fun case resulted in Clare Torry getting a songwriting credit for Pink Floyd's The Great Gig in the Sky -- which seems fair, given that she extemporized the vocals that are a major part of that song.)
Probably. But it seems you can make legal arrangements before any of these things to allow a performer to simply be paid for their input (even writing input) & therefore not have any legal claim (ever) to songwriting credits & royalties. The problem with all these rulings in favour of the smaller "I should have been credited" parties is that none of them had any legal arrangements in place; hence the (relative) success in bringing their case(s) to court. Harris/Maiden undoubtedly had no legal agreements in place.
Hardly. Some might argue that it just makes more sense not to drag shit through the courts at great expense if you've already both come to an agreement.
Would they? Maiden have better things to do with their time surely; especially if the out-of-court agreement is that other parties won't be credited.
To avoid lengthy litigation.
That would be cheaper.
To you. They'll take their own truth from the settlement & probably never talk about it in public. It might matter to you what the public at large think; maybe Steve will be happy enough being privately right. And you'll not know either way.
Until it starts to encroach on the personal time of band members, because that's time they can't be spending on band activities. I don't think they want to pull off the road for a year to fight a lawsuit, if they can help it.
Good point. Settlement, by its very nature, requires the aquiescence of both parties. And since McKay apparently has very deep pockets and was prepared to bankroll the whole thing himself he could have chosen to carry on the last one, pushing for a "win" for the sake of principle. The fact he decided not to do this suggests that he had already realised that even if he won he wasn't going to get what he wanted. He himself mentions "lower than expected figures".
Personal request to keep politics in the political threads. It has nothing to do with Maiden and I’ve personally had so many instances of people I once was friends with destroying that friendship over politics that I just cannot stand them anymore. I hate when people resort to bringing in Trump to help their argument. If you need to do that, then you had no argument in the first place.
It was not. You know full well that some people don’t hate Trump as much as you do, and all your post is is bait. You didn’t need to add anything about him in.
