GoldieBlox agreed to pay $1m to charity in Beastie Boys settlement

Argument over 'fair use' of Girls song ended in March with deal to donate to STEM education for girls

In March, the Beastie Boys reached a settlement with the US toy company GoldieBlox over the latter’s parody of their song Girls in a viral advert. Now the details of that settlement have been published.

GoldieBlox agreed to pay $1m to a charity of the band’s choice supporting science, technology, engineering and/or maths (STEM) education for girls, in return for a backdated licence to use the track in the ad, which was a YouTube hit in November 2013.

The details were revealed in a document filed as part of a separate copyright infringement lawsuit between the Beastie Boys and Monster Energy, spotted by entertainment industry journalist Eriq Gardner:

“On March 16, 2014, the parties settled… The GoldieBlox Settlement granted GoldieBlox a retroactive license to use the musical composition of ‘Girls’ between November 18, 2013 and November 28, 2013.

"In exchange, GoldieBlox agreed to make annual payments of 1% of its gross revenue, until the total payments reached $1 million, to a charitable organization chosen by the Beastie Boys and approved by GoldieBlox which supports ‘science, technology, engineering and/or mathematics education for girls’.”

The settlement will not be used as evidence in the new case after a complaint from Monster, which is accused of using several Beastie Boys songs in a 2012 snowboarding video without approval from the band.

The GoldieBlox video, which reworked the original sexist lyrics of Girls to focus on encouraging girls to explore STEM subjects, was watched 8m times in a week last November, before sparking lawsuits from both sides and a debate over whether the video's use of the song was "fair use" or not.

The Beastie Boys explained their decision in an open letter to GoldieBlox that month, saying they were respecting the wishes of member Adam Yauch, who died in 2012 and left a will explicitly banning use of his music in advertisements:

“As creative as it is, make no mistake, your video is an advertisement that is designed to sell a product, and long ago we made a conscious decision not to permit our music and/or name to be used in product ads.”

GoldieBlox responded with its own open letter after removing the track from the video:

“We don't want to fight with you … When we made our parody version of your song, Girls, we did it with the best intentions. We wanted to transform it into a powerful anthem for girls ... Although we believe our parody video falls under fair use, we would like to respect [Yauch's] wishes and yours.”

It remains to be seen how soon the $1m settlement is paid. GoldieBlox raised just under $286k on the crowdfunding site Kickstarter in 2012 to launch its business, which produces construction toys and books for girls, but its sales since the toys launched in March 2013 are unknown.

GoldieBlox: the toy designed to get girls into engineering

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