Intellectual Property Law

Michael Jackson, IP, and Culture

By Deven Desai

So first I must admit I am not a huge fan of Michael Jackson. What? Yes. No! I’m afraid so. That being said, for all the oddity that occurred in the later part of his life the man and his work highlight some interesting points in IP and culture. Thriller is the best selling album of all time. In other words, he may have been the pinnacle of the old music industry model (selling 1 million copies a week is probably impossible today). In addition, Mr. Jackson’s videos are often credited as breaking the color barrier on MTV. That shift opened the door to many other artists being able to reach the MTV audience. He also combined different genres such as funk, pop, disco, soul, and R&B to achieve a unique sound that influenced many artists and audiences around the world. In short, one may want to dig into all the full range of his work from the Jackson Five era and his solo career. There promises to be forgotten or less listened to gems merely because Thriller was such a dominant album. For me the album and song Off the Wall (which I reference in Information Privacy when teaching Kyllo) is a great example of pre-Thriller excellent work. Last, the mashups and parodies inspired by Mr. Jackson are rather good too. Examples of Fred Astaire meets Michael Jackson which works quite well (hat tip John Scalzi) and Weird Al are below the fold.

Here is the link for Off The Wall.

And while we are at it check out Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough to see the early moves and seeds of the Thriller-man to come.

The YouTube video for Eat It is here (embed disabled) which is unfortunate and foolish but I recommend watching it.

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Full post as published by Madisonian.net on June 26, 2009 (boomark / email).