Ellen DeGeneres' Show In Hot Water For Using Unlicensed Songs And She's Headed For Americal Idol

Rocking It Out With Barack
Everyone knows how much Ellen DeGeneres loves to rock out and dance with her DJ Tony Okungbowa in the beginning of all her shows. But recently, Telepictures Productions was slapped with a lawsuit for using unlicensed songs.
Ellen has been dancing to songs during her show intro for years. I wonder why this lawsuit showed up now? Seems like something the record companies would have caught a long time ago. Maybe they are just hurting by the almighty crush of the internet and can use some cash. Remember that song back in 1979, Video Killed The Radio Star by the Buggles? Well the record companies must be singing, “The internet killed the record companies.”
Not everything can go Ellen DeGeneres' way all the time.It turns out that several major record companies think the dance-happy host rocks out a little too much and are suing Telepictures Productions over the unlicensed use of more than 1,000 songs on The Ellen DeGeneres Show.
You know how Ellen and in-house DJ Tony Okungbowa love their block-rockin' beats. Per the suit, reps for Ellen said they don't "roll that way" when the labels asked why they had not licensed the tunes.
But Telepictures doesn't appear to be sweatin' the copyright-infringement suit, telling reporters they have already been working with the plaintiffs to resolve their issues on "amicable and reasonable terms."
The complaint, filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Nashville, does not name DeGeneres as a defendant. (Though theoretically this means she's been dancing to the beat of somebody else's drum all this time.)
Well I guess Telepictures isn’t worried, and I would imagine they have enough dough to make the record companies who filed the suits very happy.
Besides Ellen has bigger fish to fry these days. It was just announced that Ellen will be replacing Paula Abdul as the fourth judge on American Idol. Apparently, she is elated about being asked to join the panel, and said that she is not going to be mean like Simon Cowell, but rather will let him know when he is being too mean to contestants.
Continued on the next page


