Ed Sheeran assails copyright claim "culture" after winning Shape Of You case

Rob Beschizza 5:08 am Wed Apr 6, 2022

Chokri, a grime artist who claimed that the "Oh I" hook in Ed Sheeran's hit Shape of You infringed an "Oh why" refrain in one of his own tracks, lost his copyright case today after a gruelling two-week trial in London: 'Judge Antony Zacaroli ruled that Sheeran had "neither deliberately nor subconsciously copied" Chokri's song.'

After the verdict, Sheeran took to social media to slam baseless copyright claims.

Ed's been dealing with a lawsuit recently and he wanted to share a few words about it all pic.twitter.com/hnKm7VFcor
— Ed Sheeran HQ (@edsheeran) April 6, 2022

In a video on social media, he said there was now a culture "where a claim is made with the idea that a settlement will be cheaper than taking it to court, even if there's no basis for the claim. … It's really damaging to the songwriting industry. There's only so many notes and very few chords used in pop music."

Ed surely knows that the "songwriting industry" itself, through decades of lobbying and lawfare, helped make intellectual property law so draconian and dangerous that it's become bad for business and creative expression.

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