Advertising Gone Wrong

Both Home Depot and Pizza Hut are under fire as The Black Keys are filing copyright infringement lawsuits against the companies. The Black Keys allege that Home Depot and Pizza Hut used "Lonely Boy" and "Gold on the Ceiling" in advertisements without first obtaining permission. This article from CBS states that the $75,000 claims will likely rule in favor of The Black Keys because neither company attempted to get the rights to use the songs.

Here's Pizza Hut's commercial and below is "Gold on the Ceiling".

While Pizza Hut didn't use the exact song, it's close enough to warrant an infringement on the artists' rights. What amazes me is that large companies (who do/should have a legal team) will attempt to copy songs by artists or use their songs without their permission. Is there no one that steps in and says, "Hey, maybe we shouldn't use something so blatantly similar." 

The fact that The Black Keys have recently become very popular may play some role into wanting to use the songs, but the same thing happens to smaller artists as well. For example, VW recently ran a commercial that used a song that was strikingly similar to the Beach House song "Take Care". While VW attempted to gain permission from the band, they denied, only to find a song that sounded like one of theirs show up on the subsequent VW commercials. Beach House issued a statement saying that they had not give permission to VW and are currently deciding whether to sue the car manufacturer. 

While a song copied from a smaller artist may not be as easily caught, it's still unethical to use their creativity to market something they do not want to be associated with. One would think that in today's world, where lawsuits run rampant and legal advice is everywhere, companies would stay away from this sort of behavior, VW, the Home Depot and Pizza Hut all prove otherwise.