What this will hinge on (and why it is relevant to HN) is whether Coulton's release of songs under the Creative Commons BY-NC license (attribution, non-commerci

What this will hinge on (and why it is relevant to HN) is whether Coulton's release of songs under the Creative Commons BY-NC license (attribution, non-commercial) AND his additional statement that the the CC/non-commercial clause did not apply to covers (with encouragement to mix) still protects his copyright over the arrangement and derivative lyrical changes. I am of the opinion that he does retain these rights since the intent is clearly to not put the whole work under the CC since he can't extend his compulsory license to Sir Mix-a-Lot's lyrics to others. If he had released his arrangement separately under a CC-BY-NC, or even CC-BY, he still would have retained the copyright to that...but I don't think he ever did. It is his unfortunate wording outside the license...informal and non-legal, that creates the confusion. You see this with open source projects (usually sole developers) who release under a restrictive license but then assure you that gray area uses are permitted. These always give me pause. But when there's money on the line and license clearances are part of your business, there is absolutely no reason not to get absolute clarity and clearance before using the work. It is a lot easier to do beforehand than after, which I think Fox will find out. I predict an amicable ending and a new JC song about the ordeal that will be right up there with "Code Monkey" and "Re: your brains" in the hacker/free culture pantheon.