50 Cent Wins Lawsuit Against WorldStarHipHop

It was a long time coming but it seems Curtis Jackson, b.k.a. his stage name 50 Cent is getting the last laugh in his fight to bring popular video site WorldStarHipHop to its knees. The superstar rapper originally filed a lawsuit in 2009 against the company and its owner Lee “Q” O’Denat for copyright infringement. On Monday, March 24, a judge ruled in his favor.

50 Cent has gotten a partial victory in a lawsuit brought against a DJ who ran hip-hop website WorldStarHipHop.com. The main controversy in the lawsuit had to do with the website’s masthead featuring an image of the rapper.

In a ruling on Monday, a federal judge granted the hip-hop star summary judgment on copyright and right of publicity claims. In doing so, the judge rejected affirmative defenses including fair use. According to the ruling, “Defendants provide no authority to support the fair use of a celebrity’s image or likeness.

This is not surprising, as a celebrity’s image, standing alone, only evokes that celebrity’s persona. Jackson’s image does not, by itself, describe anything about Defendants’ website.” The entire cliffnotes of the case are available for public consumption here.

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