Law Commons^™

Social Media And “Flash-Infringement”: Live Music Culture And Dying Ip Protection, Michael M. Epstein

Belmont Law Review

This article interrogates issues of music intellectual property rights infringement at live performances. I am especially interested in music infringement at live concerts and DJ-driven mash-up parties, and the use of technologies to transfer protected content by smartphone — or remote storage device — at or near the performance site. The covalent forces of social media, including the use of smartphone apps such as Meerkat and Periscope, and flash mob culture have created a perhaps unstoppable threat to copyright and other intellectual property rights — a phenomenon that I define in this article as “flash infringement.” In a flash infringement …