This is another fine example of a copyright holder making a martyr out of someone who probably makes substantially less in income than the former.  I haven’t been able to find anything out about their incomes, but I’m assuming that Maisel makes way more per year than Baio, seeing as he has a nice chunk of money in the form of a building in Manhattan that’s worth at LEAST $30 million.  Now, as far as fair use goes, I’m more familiar with the software/music side of that realm.  But I’ll take a stab at this…Be warned that I rage at the end I wonder if Baio gave credit to Maisel’s work, as he did with the songs.   By “gave credit”, I mean getting permission, citing correctly, etc.  It may be that it just didn’t cross his mind to do so.  And while settling was the wisest financial choice, despite his reasons, I think that this ordeal serves as a scare tactic to others who would try to do something like this an use fair use as a shield.  As Matthew Ingram explains here, “Fair use isn’t much good if you can’t afford it” (which just so happens to be the title of the blog post…Tee-hee :3).

But seriously.  It’s sad that in order to save your own ass with fair use, you need to have deep. REALLY DEEEEEEEEP pockets.  I mean, I’m all for asking the original creator to use something and giving credit where credit is due, and it seems that since the album was online-only, Baio could have just edited the cover or taken it down until he got permission to use it — I can’t be sure, I don’t know how those things work (is the album art a part of the download or something?).  But for cryin’ out loud…Why drag a man through the mud and spikes an thorns?  Yes, Maisel has a right to challenge Baio’s use of his work, but really…It seems like the Shrek/Stephen Spielberg example Thomas Hawk makes here.  It’s martyrdom, if you ask me.

I’m going to stop here before I go off on a tangent here.  But before I go, I just want to say something to the overly-wealthy people who drag smaller people through hell over stuff like this:  You pukes make me sick!  I’ll bet if you used a small-time artist’s work without giving them credit or getting their permission, and they called you out on it, you’d slam ‘em so ****ing hard with your over-priced lawyers that they’d shrivel up and blow away in the wind!  You little scumbags, I’ll bet Gunnery Sergeant Hartman would have a field day with you.  Now I’d pay $32,500 to see that.