♪ ♪ i was in my car in atlanta on the tenth and 14th bridge going over the split when i heard "shake it off." first thing i thought was the track was amazing and then the hit came in ♪ the players going to play, play, play, i'm just going to shake, shake, shake, shake it off ♪ >> how does a person feel when they come home and feel like their house has been robbed? that's how i felt. ♪ players going to play, play, play, play ♪ ♪ ♪ >> you have the cream of the crop artists and taylor swift is the top. >> she's a modern pop star but old fashioned as it gets. she believes in magazine covers and performances on late night tv. a lot of the traditional ways for artists to be in the public eye. >> she is the biggest artist like in the world. she's just like rolling in dough. >> taylor swift had yet another massive year. she dropped her midnights album that rose to the top of the charts. >> you got the ticket master debacle literally crashes the website because ticket master can't keep up with the demand and that speaks to how massive of an artist she is. >> she started off in the country lane and she moved into the pop to become one of the highest selling pop stars america ever seen. taylor swift has had a very stroo -- strategic evolution of sense of self. >> people get excited with any taylor swift project but "shake it off" was big for taylor because it was a more playful side to her than we're used to seeing. >> "shake it off" was everywhere. it's actually stuck in my head a little bit. ♪ the players gonna play, play, play ♪ ♪ the haters gonna hate, hate, hate ♪ shake it off, shake it off ♪ >> just face it. you're done. this song will be in your head the rest of the day. her album "1989" sold, sold, sold, sold. >> the new single, huge hits everywhere, "shake it off" is that philosophy of not getting bogged down in that. >> people are allowed to say whatever they want about you and call a newspaper and then it's a national news story. it's easier to handle that when a sense of humor. >> one magazine headline said it best, taylor swift is the music industry. >> we were used to seeing taylor swift as like this kind of sweet, strumming the guitar talking about the boy next door and here she is standing up and got backup dancers and like i'm hip. i'm cool. i'm not here for the haters but she's not been able to shake off the com vntroversy of the song. >> people i've been with in the business for years said you know what you're doing, right? i said yeah, but i have to. i have to say something. i have to do something. when i first got into the music business, i was 17. back then it was kind of like you had to pay to get in the studio so that kind of weeded out a lot of people. getting bills was a situation. everyone has a deal now. if you had a deal then it's because you fought for it. ♪ ♪ >> so before i got in the music business i started acting doing a movie called "little spies". >> my mom cook some stuff that tastes like dog food. >> movies and a lot of commercials. i kind of grew up in the business and then when i turned like 9, 10, 11, i was like okay, music is my thing. i met nate butler through a friend. nate was just leaving college. he wanted to write music. so we met and we hit it off like immediately and became like best friends and then, you know, of course, not everything you write is going to be a smash but we got a lot of placements together. we worked on "escape." ♪ ♪ >> we love that song so much that sean produced. i feel like people really appreciated real vocals back then. people loved r and b back then. r and b was i would say bigger than hip-hop. ♪ ♪ >> my first pop hit would probably be "no more on 3 ow." ♪ ♪ >> so it's black girl groups of the late '90s and early 2000s. they had staying power. they had marketability. they could harmonize and dance. they had personality. they had identity. and they had something you could hold on to. ♪ ♪ >> nate and i worked on about three or four songs on the 3 ow album, "no more curious, players gonna play." when we wrote that we were at church and i did this track before service. i played it for nate and he's like oh my god, that's incredible. that's incredible. service is over. he's like sean, i got the hook. it's crazy. it's crazy. so we go back to the house. he sings the hook to me. i lose my mind and we're like this is a smash. this is crazy. ♪ players gonna play, haters they gonna hate, ballers they gonna ball ♪ >> we just knew sometimes when you write something and you get goose bumps, you don't know if it's going to go number one but you have a really good feeling, yeah. >> in this case, we're talking about a song that was legitimately popular. while it wasn't "shake it off" it was lwas legitimately somethn the air waves. >> 3 ow song "players gonna play" peaked at 81 but in my world at the time that was a big rec record. >> when i first heard "shake it off," i vibing with the song and when the hook hit, my mouth dropped open. we knew something had to happen. we needed to take action so somehow. at least extend an invitation to talk. we reached out, and didn't really get a response. so i called julian to get his perspective on it. julian wright is a manager slash business mind slash little bit lawyer. he went to hau rvard law school and took some classes so he was like run it by julian. >> when i heard the hook and heard players gonna play, play, i said that's 3 ow. lily! welcome to our third bark-ery. oh, i can tell business is going through the “woof”. but seriously we need a reliable way to help keep everyone connected from wherever we go. well at at&t we'll help you find the right wireless plan for you. so, you can stay connected to all your drivers and stores on america's most reliable 5g network. that sounds just paw-fect. terrier-iffic i labra-dore you round of a-paws at&t 5g is fast, reliable and secure for your business. 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[cheering] ♪ ♪ ♪ this year, we're helping our customers save for the 1.7 million things that matter most to them. ♪ just another reason why we're all better off with an ally. ♪ how many rooms are in there? should we go check it out? yeah. we get to stay here all weekend! when you stay at a vrbo... i call doing the door code! ...the host doesn't stay with you. it looks exactly like the picture. because without privacy in your vacation home... it's a full log cabin guys. ...it isn't really a vacation... we can snuggle up by the fire. ...is it? wow, oh my- [birds chirping] i recommend nature made vitamins because i trust their quality. they were the first to be verified by usp... ...an independent organization that sets strict quality and purity standards. nature made. the number one pharmacist recommended vitamin and supplement brand. i'd like to thank our sponsor liberty mutual. they customize your car insurance, so you only pay for what you need. contestants ready? go! only pay for what you need. jingle: liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. nina's got a lot of ideas for the future. and since anyone can create a free plan at fidelity, nina has a plan based on what matters most to her. and she can simply focus on right now. that's the planning effect. from fidelity. nathan butler and hall sued taylor swift saying she took it from 3 lw called "players gonna play". >> they filed a lawsuit against taylor swift saying the lines players gonna play, haters gonna hate come from 3 lw. >> for those who say they hear no similarity between "shake it off" and "players gonna play" you would have to listen to three sets of ear muffs to argue at that. >> some lawyers rerawe ran the situation by didn't get it because people say copyright infri infringement, nine times out of ten, they mean the music. there is a sample or you used my baseline and tried to hide it and blah, blah, blah. we were saying no, it's not the music. we're talking about the actual lyrics in the chorus. >> it seemed at the time it was too common a phrase, sort of like trying to trademark or to copy copyright what's up? eveni everyone uses it. hate the player not the game. >> so there is also a cultural component here where a lot of folks feel like artists, main stream artists like a taylor swift has the agency to take a little bit of black culture, use it at her disposal, remix it and wash her hands of it and say i didn't know this is where it came from and might not even be happening purposefully or maliciously but it does happen. >> player and hater, words like that definitely didn't come from, you know, a country artist, it came from in the hood. >> check it out, babe. you say he's the smoothest player out the three of us here. [ laughter ] >> hey, hey, hey, don't be a player hater my brother. [ laughter ] >> one of the original players. from the himalayas. >> in the '90s and early 2000s as hip-hop and r and b and black music in general enjoying this title wave of cultural influence, a lot of terms that were natural and say no, ma'am mouse synonymous at large like player hater, shot caller, baller. ♪ want to be ballers, shot callers ♪ >> scrub. ♪ no, i don't want no scrub ♪ >> "scrub" was on my note pad. i would use that for a title. that was a saying me and my home girls would say, i don't want no scrub. we need to do a song, you know, calling scrubs or whatever. i give you the definition of scrubs. the first line of a song. ♪ a scrub is a guy that thinks he's fly and also known as a busta ♪ heller. that's what a scrub is and now the whole world knows it. >> with the taylor swift shake it off case, it's almost a non-starter because it was thrown out by the first judge who heard it. >> judge w. michael fitzgerald dismissed the case saying combining the phrases players gonna play, haters gonna doesn't doesn't worry copyright infringement. >> the judge said that particular phrase was too brief, too unoriginal, too common basically to be a legitimate copyright claim. >> when you're a songwriter, you pride yourself oncoming up with new fresh lingo, phrases, ways to convey an idea and when you do that and it's used someplace else, it will make you feel a certain way. ♪ ♪ >> you don't go through a process for five, six years of challenges not knowing what the end will be. cases can be emotional. ups and downs, sad, happy, you know, excited, not excited, just i wasn't nervous or scared. we got messages. we've gotten death threats. it doesn't phase me. there are points in times where it's been a thing but scared, i wouldn't say scared. this situation is bigger than me. it bigger than my kids. it's bigger than their kids. this situation affects us as a community, people of color and someone has to stand up. >> after that decision was rendered, sean and nate decided to appeal the demissile -- dismissal. that's when i came in. come combining those two pharases an taking the same number of sill bolls, choosing words that have negative connotations, haters, choosing a word -- >> i understand you're arguing -- but let me just -- my question was much narrower. >> so sure, the phrases themselves might become monobut that's not what the claim is. the claim is that sean and nate put together an original combination of phrases, they took players gonna play, haters gonna hate and put them together in a chorus. >> sean and nate are saying not only are the lyrics basically identical but also the combination and the order in which these lyrics appear in players gonna play and "shake it off." taylor swift's defense saying hold on a second, taylor writes all her own music. these lyrics were inspired by common place phrases used in her school and there is no monopoly over that phrase. >> i argued why that case should continue to trial. >> there has to be concrete similarities and what they're relying on are abtractions. there is a big difference between row your boat and row, row, row your boat. those are different things. players gonna play and because the players are gonna play, play, play are different uses. this is exactly the core of creativity. if i recorded a song today that began of course the players gonna play, play, play and the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, would ms. swift have a claim against me? >> if you're talking i den tt killy copying -- >> you said players gonna play, are your client's phrases long enough to get copyright protection. >> if somebody took the same chorus somebody did in "take shake it off," i'm sure taylor swift would sue. >> you have the exact number of reputations and the plaintiff's work with no repetition at all. no repetition at all means it's not protected. >> i think there is an argument with this number of repetitions it is protected. >> thank you. >> thank you, your honor. >> i think that was also a point that influenced the ninth circuit saying yes, this case should proceed. ♪ ♪ >> the thing that stood out to me was more than just the words. there were quite a few structural things that i saw within the composition that's in both songs. they're both used as the hooks, a hook is -- that's the chorus, that's the part of the song everybody remembers. >> in the "shake it off" lawsuit taylor swift's team is arguing the phrase, players gonna play, haters gonna hate are part of the public domain. they've been out there and fair use and alleging it's a money grab from hall and butler, that they see this as an opportunity to make money off of taylor swift because she's so incredibly successful. but it's obvious that taylor knows how the game should be played. taylor swift wrote "look what you made me do". ♪ look what you made me do, look what you made me do ♪ >> and gave credit to the three members of right said fred because she said there are similar ities between my song ad their "i'm too sexy" hit. ♪ i'm too sexy for my shirt, too sexy for my shirt ♪ >> your option is to change a song or reach out to the person that wrote the song you're worried about and cut them a deal, get them involved in the song writing credits and then everyone is happy either way. >> very smart on taylor swift's part because she didn't wait for somebody to point it out. she said you know what? i recognize it. i'm going to give them credit. clearly she understands that if there are more than a few similarities, that you need to give credit where credit is due. also shows she's aware of the how the music industry works. >> taylor swift as an artist and as a businesswoman has always kind of fashioned herself as a champion for songwriters and for giving songwriters their credit where it's due. >> i'm in the get away car, left you not motel bar. >> took the money in the bag and stole -- took the money in the bag and i stole the keys, that's the last time you ever saw me. >> it shows you the complications even taylor swift who is certainly an advocate for her own song writing authority is herself kind of roped into this. >> the difference between cultural appropriation and cultural appreciation is credit. if you like something, pay for it. if you like that shirt or that design, pay for it. >> young lady who is mid 30s, couple kids, recently went through a divorce. she had a lot of questions when she came in. i watched my mother go through being a single mom. at the end of the day my mom raised three children including myself and so once a client knew she was heard, we were able to help her move forward. your client won't care how much you know until they know how much you care. shipgo this whole thing wouldn't be a thing. yeah, dad! i don't want to deal with this. oh, you brought your luggage to the airport. that's adorable. with shipgo shipping your luggage before you fly you'll never have to wait around here again. like ever. that can't be comfortable though. shipgo.com the smart, fast, easy way to travel. it's official, america. xfinity mobile is the fastest mobile service. and gives you unmatched savings with the best price for two lines of unlimited. only $30 a line per month. the fastest mobile service and major savings? can't argue with the facts. no wonder xfinity mobile is one of the fastest growing mobile services, now with over 5 million customers and counting. save hundreds a year over t-mobile, at&t and verizon. talk to our switch squad at your local xfinity store today. appropriation, borrowing without givingpropriation is ou stealing and saying that it's your own. >> it's that disparity and that unfairness that people are constantly on the lookout for because it's so historic and it's so weaved into the american culture. >> i think a lot of people are just now waking up to the fact that most music genres that were birthed in america were birthed by black people. ♪ ♪ >> and were stolen and popularized by main stream white artists. >> the issue of cultural appropriation really speaks to the roots of the music industry. which have been for as long as recording as existed has really been riding on the back of black talent. some recording contracts still say the record company will own the master and any slave recordings, a slave is a copy of the master. the roots of these terms obviously go back to the very birth of the nation era of white supremacy. >> almost since the beginning of the music industry, there have been the feeling that white artists have taken from black artists and made it into something that they felt was more palatable for a white audience. >> the money doesn't flow, the attention doesn't flow to the black creators. it is in a way hijacked by the white creators. >> i think when it comes to copyright lawsuits, legal decisions don't have anything to do with ethical ones and cultural falls into that appropriation. >> "sweet little 16" was rewritten by the beach boys as "surfing usa." ♪ ♪ ♪ across the usa ♪ >> it's the same song almost entirely. ♪ come so excited ♪ ♪ surfing usa ♪ >> brian even admitted that he was rewriting "sweet little 16" when he wrote "surfing usa". >> if you look back, i think the george harrison case with my sweet lord and the chiffons, "he's so fine." ♪ he's so fine, wish he were mine ♪ ♪ my sweet lord ♪ ♪ my lord ♪ >> that's probably the case that sort of set the table for what we're looking at now. ♪ i really want to see you ♪ ♪ ♪ >> the generally accepted story is that him, let's just say ripping off the chiffons "he's so fine" was an accident. >> it was one of the biggest songs at the time so i believed george harrison that he could have heard that song and it could have subconsciously influenced him. >> subconscious plagiarism is when you copy something without intent or without realizing it. the way that people make mistakes with accidental plagiarism is just human nature. >> if you can prove that you independently created a song that substantially similar to another but had no idea, had never heard of the preexisting song is just purely coincidental that is a defense. >> he didn't deny he knew the song. it was a big hit but it was just something that he didn't put together and he thought he had written a totally original song. george harrison lost that case and was required to pay a lot of money. when you have these discussions about music copyright cases, you don't have to prove intent. that's sort of impossible. but you do need to prove access in the case of 3 lw access is inherit when your song was on the charts. ♪ ♪ >> it was on "trl." >> please put your hands together for 3 lw. >> "trl" was everything. >> make some noise for britney spears. >> live on "trl "is christina aguilera. >> adults were watching it. kids were watching it. the industry was watching it. that basically was the ultimate playlist. >> the music that you connect with when you're 10, 11, 12 years old, that is among the most impactful music of your life. you know, that's the stuff that you're going to carry into your teens and into your 2