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Yoko Ono Imagines Legal Defeat
06/02/2008 5:00 PM, E! Online
Like the rest of us, Yoko Ono has to live in a world that's one with the fair-use doctrine. John Lennon's widow has lost her bid to keep 15 seconds of her late husband's song "Imagine" out of a documentary about scientists and educators who support the theory of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution. Ono, son Sean Lennon and publisher EMI Blackwood Music Inc., which holds the rights to all of Lennon's music, sued the makers of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed in federal court last month, arguing that the unsanctioned use of "Imagine" in their film implied that the family had willingly licensed the song. "Internet 'bloggers' immediately began accusing Mrs. Lennon of 'selling out' by licensing the song to defendants," Ono's suit charged. But U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein agreed with the defendants that their use of Lennon's most revered solo tune was allowable under the fair-use doctrine, which "provides that the fair use of a copyrighted work for purposes of criticism and commentary is not an infringement of copyright." "They put the song to a different purpose, selected an excerpt containing the ideas they wished to critique, paired the music and lyrics with images that contrast with the song's utopian expression, and placed the excerpt in the context of a debate regarding the role of religion in the public life," Stein wrote in his decision. Ono has said she will appeal the ruling.
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