Earlier this month there was news that Joe Satriani was suing Coldplay for plagiarising one of Satch’s songs. Not surprisingly this was very interesting to me since plagiarism is a big deal for librarians. And this is what I’ll say about the case. Just like the possibility of plagiarism in a school setting Coldplay should take this accusation very seriously. At the end of this post are some videos for you to watch to see what people on YouTube have uploaded regardint this situation.
I also realize and others have said it before me that it is very difficult, I can imagine, to write a song and not have some part of it be done before by someone before you. I know that when I hear songs, and I listen to a lot of music, there are certian things in different pieces that remind me of someone else’s music. In some respects, it’s kind of like what happens when writing a paper. Unless you’re doing original research, someone before you has already probably said it. And whether or not you remembered to write down that you found out X piece of information on page whatever of Y book, you can get yourself in trouble. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not condoning what looks to me like plagiarism on Coldplay’s part nor am I condoning it if a student plagiarizes. I think the thing that I’m getting at is that nobody is perfect. We all make mistakes, intentionally or not. I know that one of the things that I tell students is that to make sure that they cite information as they found it. In my opinion it’s better to over cite than under cite. But, just because you forgot to cite something properly or you unintentionally borrowed a few lines from someone’s song and incorporated it into your own, it’s still a problem. That’s why plagiarism is such a tricky thing to teach, let alone understand – for students, musicians, or people in general. I certainly don’t!
So, the question I’d ask you is whether you think Coldplay ripped off Satch. Watch these videos from a guitar expert in Canada or listen to a call in radio station recording (sorry, I don’t know what radio station so I can’t verify the authenticity). And, for those of you out there that are librarians, what do you do to teach plagiarism? I’d be interested to find out how you deal with this issue.
