Thread by @senamisomoyo

Welcome to #IPThursday good people! Sorry for the wait. This week We take a look at one of Jay-Z’s biggest songs and the issue of moral rights. The question today is, should you have a say in how your song is sampled if you sold the rights to someone else.

The first star of our story today is Beyoncé’s husband, 😂 I mean, Shawn Carter, better known by his stage name. Born in December 1969, he is widely regarded as one of the greatest rappers of all time.

Jay Z rose to fame in the early 90s. Initially, he was unable to secure a record deal, so he decided to form his own label, Roc-A-Fella-Records in 1995. He got to straight to work and released his album “Reasonable Doubt” the following year. It was a huge success!

Reasonable Doubt propelled Jay Z to greatness. He decided to follow it up with a series of albums titled “In my lifetime”, starting with Volume 1. Which did better than his previous album. So he decided to release Volume 2 and 3.

Jay Z started experimenting with different sounds and working with different producers on “In My lifetime Volume 3”. So he went to the second star of our story, the one man he knew could cook up a serious beat, Tim Mosley better known as “Timberland”.

Jay was working on his 3rd and final single when he asked Timberland to produce it for him. And Timberland duly obliged, he cooked up a beat and Jay was kinda feeling it. He liked it!

Jay then released his single “Big Pimpin”. It was the most successful single on the album and it was critically acclaimed. All of sudden, everyone was talking about Jay Z as being the greatest rapper of all time and Timberland being one of the best hip hop producers ever.

The song itself is iconic, and any religious listener of hip hop knows it, and has probably sang along to it. The tune is slick and the lyrics are slick.

However, upon release of the song, Jay and Tim were slapped with a lawsuit for copyright infringement from EMI Music Arabia. EMI music held the rights to a song known as “Khosara Khosara” recorded and released in 1957 by Egyptian artist Baligh Hamdy.

Hamdy was an Egyptian composer who produced songs for many Arabic artists. In 1957, he released the tune “Khosara Khosara”. Sounds familiar right?

Its normal for composers to transfer their rights in the song to different record labels. The rights to “Khosara were later acquired by EMI Music Arabia and when EMI heard “Big Pimpin”, they took it personally. Very personally.

Jay and Tim denied that they stole the song. However, they claimed that they legally sampled “Khosara”. They claimed that they thought the tune was in the public domain and could be used by anyone. Hamdy himself had passed away in 1993.

However, they were wrong and in 2001, they settled with EMI for $100,000. The settlement agreement transferred the rights to the song to Jay Z and Timberland. So Sorted right? Well......No not at all.

When this matter was being settled, Hamdy’s heirs found out about the lawsuit and then later, they heard the song. I’m not sure what music Egyptians like, but I guess rap music is definitely not it for them.

For most of us, Big Pimpin was just another hip hop song, but for Hamdy’s family. It was a disrespectful work and they didn’t like it.

The video itself features Jay Z on a yacht, surrounded by half naked women, you know, like a rap video. He was bragging. They thought the lyrics and the video tarnished Hamdy’s legacy and they did not want him associated with it in any way.

So in 2007, his nephew Osama Fahmy, dragged Jay Z, Timberland and EMI to court in the US. His claim was that the song infringed on his uncle’s moral rights.

Lemme just explain what moral rights are. Moral rights are the rights that an author has to their copyrighted works. The idea is that even if someone else owns the work in future, the author retains his moral rights. Regardless of who owns it, these rights untransferable.

Moral rights are split into two parts, a right to paternity, which is a right to be recognized as the author and a right to integrity, which is the right to object to any use of the work that paints you in a bad light. Basically, if it doesn’t align with your brand.

Hamdy’s family claimed that the use of his song on Big Pimpin “mutilated” his moral rights and harmed his legacy. They said Hamdy would have never approved of his song being sampled in such a manner and they should have asked the family first.

Tbh, a lot of Arab countries are very reserved and I don’t think the muslim community would have approved on the song being with girls in bikinis dancing to it.

Jay and Tim argued that because they had acquired the rights to the song from EMI, they could use it however they eant. They also felt that the nephew was looking for a quick pay day. Jay Z was on the brink of becoming a billionaire and Timberland was the best producer around.

They also provided proof that when they settled with EMI, they got all the rights to the song, on condition that they don’t distribute it in Egypt. This idea was that moral rights would not be an issue, as long as they don’t distribute in Egypt.

Furthermore, although they are recognized in the US, Moral rights are rarely applied over there. Once your transfer the rights, you usually don’t have a say on what happens. Its different in other countries where the standards of morality/culture/religion are high.....like Africa

So the judge had to decide, did the song infringe on Hamdy’s moral right? Everyone in music was paying close attention to this case. Can singing about money and women tarnish the original producer’s legacy.

If Fahmy won, then this would mean that anyone who sold the rights to their songs, could have the power to control how its sampled going forward.

After an 8 year court battle, the judge ruled that the moral rights could not be enforced outside of Egypt. He also said that in any event, the nephew did not have legal standing to claim moral rights on behalf of someone else. Jay Z and Timberland won.

This was probably the right decision in my opinion. Unless the song is used in a manner that really paints you in a bad image, then you shouldn’t have a say if you sold it. Its such a difficult thing to judge because morality standards are so different everywhere in the world.

Big Pimpin continues to be played. Moral rights apply in most countries but what a lot of record labels do now is get you to “waive” the right to claim them in future.

Sidenote: @paulkasekesnr looks like Timberland.

MORAL of today’s story (see what I did there😂), even if you sell your rights to someone else, you do still have a say regarding how its used. Albeit, the standards are very high. Stay Safe Good People! ❤️💛💚