Taylor Swift Wins Lawsuit Days After Travis Kelce Wedding
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Taylor Swift has spent her whole life putting her feelings into words.
And despite poet Kimberly Marasco’s lawsuit alleging some of Swift’s lyrics were a copyright infringement of her poems, a federal judge has dismissed Marasco’s case—allowing Swift to shake off the claims once and for all.
In the ruling, obtained by E! News July 6, U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon asserts that “the allegedly infringed material—basic ideas, themes, metaphors, isolated words, and short phrases—is not protected expression and cannot be infringed.”
Additionally, in order to prove copyright infringement, a plaintiff needs to provide direct evidence of copying by showing that “(a) that Defendants had access to her works and (b) that the works are ‘so substantially similar . . . that an average lay observer would recognize the alleged copy as having been appropriated from the original work.’”
In this case, however, the Court ruled that Marasco “has failed to plausibly allege either access or substantial similarity, each of which is independently required to plead copying.”
As for which of Swift’s lyrics Marasco—who has self-published various books of poetry—alleged were taken from her works, the dismissal cites Swift’s lyrics in “The Man” against one of Marasco’s poems “Ordinary Citizen.”
In her song, Swift sings, “I’m so sick of running as fast as I can / Wondering if I’d get there quicker if I was a man,” which Marasco alleged is similar to the line in her poem that reads, “I’m running behind / You say its His word against mine.”
Photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for for TAS Rights Management
The dismissal, however, files the concept of “a woman working in a corporate environment” under the category of “basic ideas and themes,” noting such content is not “a proper subject of copyright protection.”
Judge Cannon’s ruling—which was filed just three days after Swift and Travis Kelce tied the knot in New York City—also dismissed the case with prejudice, meaning Marasco cannot refile her lawsuit with the same claims in the future.
The document notes that Marasco had filed a similar lawsuit against Swift in the past, and that she had been “expressly warned” that this would be her final chance and that any “further amendment would be futile.”
“The defects identified are not pleading defects curable by more careful drafting,” Judge Cannon wrote of the issues she identified within the lawsuit, adding, “they are defects in the underlying works themselves, which consist of ideas, themes, metaphors, and isolated words that no amendment can transform into protectable expression.”
As for Swift’s camp, her legal team had previously argued to have the case dismissed.
“This is plaintiff’s second frivolous and harassing lawsuit against artist,” Swift’s attorney Douglas Baldridge said in a December filing, per Billboard. “Plaintiff’s claims are, as in her last lawsuit, absurd and legally baseless.”
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