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Judge Tosses Lawsuit Against Timbaland, Nelly Furtado

A Miami judge has thrown out a lawsuit levied against Timbaland and Nelly Furtado by a record label claiming the duo stole their song.

Originally filed back in 2009 by Finnish label Kernal Records Oy, the suit contends that Tim and Furtado took elements of their artists song “Acid Jazzed Evening” and unlawfully used it on the 2006 Furtado song “Do It.”

Tim appeared to get off on a technicality.

Kernal originally claimed “Acid Jazzed Evening,” was published on Australian disk magazine Vandalism News in 2002 and posted to the Internet later that year.

The just of the case came down to, “whether the European tracks were first published on the Internet or in Europe.”

US Copyright laws stipulate, “music published first on the Internet is considered U.S.-created and must be copyrighted to be protected.”

Kernal failed to copyright the song before filing the suit in which they were seeking $10 – $20 million in damages.

“We’re very happy,” said Timbaland representative Karen Stetson. “We thought from the beginning that this issue was an important one and followed the plain language of the federal Copyright Act. But the other side was trying to get away from the plain language of the Copyright Act.”

 

Kernal plans to appeal the judges ruling.

A YouTube video is circulating the net comparing both songs and shows that both sound strikingly similar.

Listen to “Do It” compared to “Acid Jazzed Evening” below.