Prince In Legal Battle Over Dancing Baby Video

A toddler dancing to a Prince song in a YouTube video occupied the Ninth Circuit Tuesday morning, as the court explored how copyright holders are supposed to assert their rights when they suspect infringement online.

Courthouse News reports the case harkens back to the winter of 2007, when Stephanie Lenz, of Gallitzin, Pa., filmed a short home movie of her son Holden dancing while the Prince song "Let's Go Crazy" played in the background.

"The video bears all the hallmarks of a family home movie," court documents said. "[I]t is somewhat blurry, the sound quality is poor, it was filmed with an ordinary digital video camera, and it focuses on documenting Holden's 'dance moves' against a background of normal household activity, commotion and laughter."


The entire "performance" lasted 29 seconds, with "Let's Go Crazy" heard for about 20 of them, the documents state. Lenz posted the video on YouTube to share it with family and friends, particularly her mother in California.

Nevertheless, Prince allegedly pushed Universal Music, which was his publishing administrator at the time, to tell YouTube to take down the toddler video, along with 200 others making unauthorized use of his music.

Universal Att. Kelly Klaus

Lenz was put on notice that her use of Prince's music violated the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and that if she violated it again, she could lose her YouTube account and any videos she'd uploaded to it.

Following the procedures spelled out in the Act, Lenz requested that YouTube repost the video, which was called "Let's Go Crazy #1," and she sued Universal Music, arguing that giant entertainment company misrepresented the basis for its takedown request.

Universal did not conduct a fair use analysis, she said, and it should be obvious that the video was fair use of copyrighted material. The copyright law's fair use doctrine allows use of copyrighted material without permission from the rights holder in certain circumstances.

Universal's attorney, Kelly Klaus acknowledged the difficulty of analyzing fair use, but said that Prince did not want his music synchronized to videos and posted to YouTube.

Judge Tallman said the court was struggling with whether the video was fair use.

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