I hate the Romantics
At least I do now. They have filed a federal lawsuit against Activision for using too accurate a “sound alike” in Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the ’80s.
The kicker? Activision licensed their song fair and square for the game. The Romantics feel they are due money not because Activision violated their copyright, in fact they admit that they honored it, they are claiming that the cover band sounded so much like them that they infringed on the group’s right to their own likeness.
Cover bands beware, if you are good at what you do, you might find yourself singing the blues. Umm, wow, that was really bad. Sorry about that.
To me the issue here is fairness. This was not the first Guitar Hero game, in fact it was the third. The previous two used sound-a-likes, so how could the handlers of the Romantics not expect the same in the new version.
To the Romantics: there is something I don’t like about you! What happened ever happened to rockers being rebels instead of lawyers?
The system is silly, we know that. But it is mostly so because people are unreasonable. Perhaps we need to spend more time on civility than legality.
-Rahjur
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