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Revenge. Typically, a dish best served cold. But this revenge comes with a side of beef…and it’s piping hot.

Over the past month, Grammy-award winning rappers Drake and Kendrick Lamar have lobbed unsavory insults and thrown vicious verbal jabs at one another through a series of diss tracks. What began as medium-rare beef has been rapidly overcooked, with mainstream media turning up the heat and propelling the feud into the public spotlight. While media moguls such as Fox and NBC have weighed in on the debate, social media influencers and online streamers have propelled the narrative around the beef to heights not seen in rap since the early 90’s and certainly not in the social media era. And all this is thanks to the protections of copyright law and the rights therein held by copyright owners.

As social media and online streaming have started to monopolize the online media sphere, musicians and record labels are quick to enforce their copyright protections over their work. The Digital Millenium Copyright Act (“DMCA”), passed by Congress in 1988, aims to limit and manage digital copyright infringement and liabilities. The DMCA provides a framework, a DMCA Takedown, whereby musicians and record labels can petition to have their infringed content removed.

The DMCA Takedown operates in two steps. First, the Online Service Provider (“OSP”) or Internet Service Provider (“ISP”) is put on notice of the alleged infringement. Second, once the OSP or ISP is put on notice of the infringement, they must remove the alleged infringement. Failure to comply could expose the OSP or ISP to liability and potential long-term ramifications. However, upon receiving notice of the alleged infringement, the infringing party can counter-claim the DMCA Takedown and take the copyright owner to court to have the matter adjudicated.

How does this relate to rap beef? With the war of words between the artists raging on, it has been their fans, or foes, who have propelled the beef forward. Drake and Kendrick Lamar, as well as their teams and record labels, have removed many of the copyright protections initially on their diss tracks and related music videos, refusing to enforce a DMCA Takedown. As a result, social media influencers and online streamers alike have spent ample time reacting to the music videos, analyzing the barbs embedded in the lyrics, and stimulating discourse around the feud. Empowered by the lack of enforcement regarding copyright infringement, individuals have been able to profit from their reactionary work, while simultaneously serving as novice marketers for the searing beef.

For years, copyright protection has been used to prevent others from infringing and exploiting creative works for monetary gain. Here, both artists flip this protection on its head, cashing in on the lucrative marketing scheme while generating profit and promotion. All thanks to the powers of copyright protection and the rights held by copyright owners.

For help with your small business’s copyright needs, contact the SBEC at businessclinic@elon.edu.

 

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