These Damages Are My Damages
Update on This Land from CNN:

The bit is hilarious. Unless you are The Richmond Organization, a music publisher that owns the copyright to Guthrie's tune through its Ludlow Music unit.

"This puts a completely different spin on the song," said Kathryn Ostien, director of copyright licensing for the publisher. "The damage to the song is huge."

TRO believes that the Jibjab creation threatens to corrupt Guthrie's classic -- an icon of Americana -- by tying it to a political joke; upon hearing the music people would think about the yucks, not Guthrie's unifying message. The publisher wants Jibjab to stop distribution of the flash movie.

Of course the creators behind Jibjab don't agree.

"We consider it a case of political satire and parody and therefore entitled to the fair use exemption of the copyright act," said Jibjab attorney Ken Hertz.

So, let's look at this completely different spin. "This Land" is a nice happy song, isn't it? Sure, in the same way that "Born in the U.S.A." is patriotic, and "When a Man Loves a Woman" is a love song. As Bad Culture notes:

It's stunning how blind the Richmond Organization seems to be to the irony of its stance. From the official website of Woody's son Arlo Guthrie, here are some lyrics from the song which the Richmond Organization appears to have forgotten:
As I was walkin' - I saw a sign there
And that sign said - no tress passin'
But on the other side .... it didn't say nothin!
Now that side was made for you and me!

Chorus

In the squares of the city - In the shadow of the steeple
Near the relief office - I see my people
And some are grumblin' and some are wonderin'
If this land's still made for you and me.

Guthrie's song isn't just a simple-minded message of unity. It's a fierce cry from the dustbowls of the Depression in the defense of human freedom and life over blind claims of property. Does the Jibjab song do "huge" damage to that message? Hardly. It's precisely because we all treasure the orginal song's big-hearted defense of freedom that it works so well in a satire of election year pettiness. The Richmond Organization should realize that the fact that the Jibjab boys picked the song is a tribute to its message. And they should recognize that Guthrie himself would likely have been far more sympathetic with the Jibjab boys' claims of fair use in the name of satire than with the Richmond Organization's petty claims of copyright infringement.

The EFF also notes that Guthrie himself was a bit free with his copyrights. While no one has stated that "This Land" used the copyright notice I reproduced below, Guthrie apparently did use this notice at times:

"This song is Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright # 154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don't give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that's all we wanted to do."

Well, it's time to consult with an expert on the subject - Weird Al Yankovic. Here's a statement from Al's FAQ regarding his views on parodies:

Does Al get permission to do his parodies?

Al does get permission from the original writers of the songs that he parodies. While the law supports his ability to parody without permission, he feels it's important to maintain the relationships that he's built with artists and writers over the years. Plus, Al wants to make sure that he gets his songwriter credit (as writer of new lyrics) as well as his rightful share of the royalties.


Let's read a little further:

What about Coolio? I heard that he was upset with Al about "Amish Paradise."

That was a very unfortunate case of misunderstanding between Al's people and Coolio's people. Short version of the story: Al recorded "Amish Paradise" after being told by his record label that Coolio had given his permission for the parody. When Al's album came out, Coolio publicly contended that he had never given his blessing, and that he was in fact very offended by the song. To this day we’re not exactly sure who got their facts wrong, but Al sincerely apologizes to Coolio for the misunderstanding.

As far as I can tell, Coolio never sued Al...