![]() When a popular TikTok celebrity does a dance, do they have the obligation to tag the less-famous person who invented it? The debate around who owns a viral dance, at least on TikTok, is more about crediting etiquette. No one is planning to sue over the Renegade or any single TikTok dance, probably. If the lawsuits continue, they could end up being historic and precedent-setting cases that would affect the future of dance and the internet at large, although most of them have been on pause for nearly a year with no clear updates. “It also opens up all sorts of thorny edge cases around street performance and other public forms of dance, as well as the actions of countless people on social media, YouTube, and other online video channels.” ![]() “If an artist could claim a copyright in an individual step, it may make free expression with the human body prohibitively difficult without legal risk,” Statt explains. It’s likely that these lawsuits may not get far. The company has been sued by several creators for using their dances in the game: There’s the rapper 2 Milly for the Milly Rock, “Backpack kid” Russell Horning for his flossing move, and Fresh Prince of Bel-Air actor Alfonso Ribeiro for, what else, the Carlton. In a piece for The Verge on dance-stealing lawsuits against Epic, the video game company that owns the massively popular game Fortnite, Nick Statt explains that no one really knows the legality of Fortnite’s homages. These questions have never actually been litigated in court, though. In short, it’s why you’re allowed to do the moonwalk and the macarena without anybody suing you. It does not include protections for “ordinary motor activities, social dances, commonplace movements or gestures, or athletic movements” - thus excluding yoga positions, ballroom dances, or, say, a celebratory touchdown dance. The history of copyrighting dance in comparison to other art forms is quite recent: The Copyright Law of 1976 was the first to allow choreographers to protect their work, but even then, it was intended for ballets and other lengthy and prestigious compositions. One of the most perennial questions of the past decade on social media - who owns a viral dance? - has naturally resurfaced on a platform where dancing has the potential to make you a millionaire.ĭances are virtually impossible to legally claim as one’s own. On TikTok, where dancing in place in front of a camera has become a de facto language for everyone from celebrities to regular teens in their bedrooms, it’s a particularly timely subject. ![]() The Renegade is just one of the dozens of viral internet dances whose choreographers have gone largely unacknowledged as they take over the world.
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