The Richmond Organization, the music publisher that owns the copyright to Guthrie's tune through its Ludlow Music unit has decided to sue the owners of JibJab for copyright violation for using the song, "This Land is Your Land" in their political satire.
Allen Wastler, CNN's managing editor for CNN/Money,
writes that the current owners of Woody Guthrie's song, The Richmond Organization, feel that JibJab have "ruined" the song by tying it to a political satire.
My question is, how did they end up owning the song when Woody Guthrie released it? Here's a copy of his original copyright for the song:
This song is Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright # 154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin' it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don't give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that's all we wanted to do.
So how did this corporation get their money grubbing hands on his song(s)?