Legal Battle Continues Over YouTube Video of Baby Dancing to Prince Song

by Wendy Davis
Online Media Daily
April 29, 2008

Stephanie Lenz's homemade clip of her 13-month-old son dancing to Prince's "Let's Go Crazy" is only 29 seconds long, but the litigation it sparked has dragged on for nearly one year now with no signs of slowing down.

Universal Music Group last June asked YouTube to remove the clip, claiming the video infringed on the copyright to "Let's Go Crazy." Lenz protested, arguing that the background music to her toddler, Holden, dancing was a fair use. Six weeks later, YouTube restored the video. 

But that was only the beginning. Legal proceedings ensued, pitting the digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation against a major record label in a battle regarding when it's legitimate to complain that clips violate copyright.

The digital civil liberties group alleges that Universal should have never asked YouTube to remove the homemade clip, which the group called "a self-evident non-infringing fair use." The group initially filed suit against Universal last summer, seeking damages for allegedly violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act by making misrepresentations about a clip.

Universal responded that the fair use issue wasn't clear-cut, and also argued that the lawsuit itself violated the record label's free speech rights. To support the latter claim, Universal said that its takedown notice sent to YouTube was itself a form of speech.

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Photo is a frame from the video by Stephanie Lenz.